


coming home

by spritzerr



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Childhood Friends, Angst, Bisexual Lance (Voltron), Female Pronouns for Pidge | Katie Holt, Fluff, Gay Keith (Voltron), Gen, Hunk (Voltron) is a Good Friend, Hunk (Voltron) is so Pure, IT GETS BETTER!!!, It Gets Better, James Griffin (Voltron) Being an Asshole, Keith (Voltron) is Bad at Feelings, Lance (Voltron) is a Mess, Lance (Voltron)-centric, M/M, Multi, Pidge | Katie Holt is Savage, Swearing, What are Tags lmao, but again, rated mature cuz swearing and some tw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-16
Updated: 2020-08-16
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:09:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 32,401
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25939438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spritzerr/pseuds/spritzerr
Summary: Lance Serrano didn’t think that only one event can turn his whole life upside down.klance childhood friends!au
Relationships: Hunk & Lance & Pidge | Katie Holt, Keith/Lance (Voltron)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 23





	coming home

**Author's Note:**

> hey, this is my first work, so yeah  
> hope you enjoy!!
> 
> also, tw: weird things in cuba, fcked up tradition, mild swearing and a bit of homophobic language, but nothing to decriptive

Cuba may be one of the most crowded places for holidays, especially all the resorts on Varadero, but Emanuela Ramirez doesn’t think about this place in any kind of superlatives. Life in a traditional community is tiring, particularly if you look at the fact that the girl is only seventeen years old and has many plans for her own life.

It’s one year left and she’ll finish high school, after which her biggest dream is to go to college and continue on educating herself. But nothing is that simple, not here in Cuba and the reason behind it it’s pretty simple, yet also dumb and pointless. Emanuela is a woman and in order to the tradition she should stay at home and look after her children, definitely not think about any kind of education.

All women fight for this life and Emanuela doesn’t understand why it’s happening. They don’t have to care about money, okay, but the girl looks at her mother every day and she knows that working at home is not as simple and easy as people like to describe it. It’s hard to get even a minute of proper rest, especially when you have to maintain four kids.

Emanuela is the oldest child and she’s been looking for a job for a few months now, even though her mother keeps saying that it’s not necessary at all. The girl, however, can’t stand preying on María — a woman who gave her everything she could’ve ever dreamt of.

At school Emanuela has only one familiar soul, who’s Diego, a boy from one class above her. One year earlier she completely didn’t care about being in a relationship, but now everything’s different. Every person in her family likes her friend and they even may be planning a secret marriage for them. Emanuela thinks about that too, but only sometimes, in the middle of the night and she will never ever admit it, even if it was completely obvious.

Emanuela knows she can’t put her own plans above her family’s well being. Recently, nothing goes as it should be. Her dad, Enrique spends only more and more time in the casino and Emanuela’s the only child who knows what he’s really doing there. She understands the man is done with everything, if she was him she would more likely break down long ago. But, as much as she tries to, she can’t get why he leaves her mother with all the stuff, completely alone. The woman lacks support, husband’s helping hand, because she’s ashamed of asking her daughter for help.

The girl is barely at home now. She works at nights as a waitress at the bar near the hotel that’s always crowded with many foreigners. She talks to them with bad, stuttering English she learnt mostly by listening to tourists from the United States.

But still, men are disgusting and only Diego standing behind the bar’s counter saves her from absolutely losing her mind. The boy reminds her why they’re actually here. They both have messed up houses and the atmosphere in them is not the best and that’s the main reason why they get along so well. Diego’s father is an alcoholic, but nobody really minds as he is the householder and deserves something from his life. The way he achieves said ‘something’ it’s up to him and him only, so nobody has the right to judge him. Mother raises five kids, but she can’t deal with it all alone now. Diego and his older brother, Santiago, do everything they can to lead the family to the better life they all deserve. Neither of them ever thought about about further education, they just knew they couldn’t be distracted from what they had to do. They’re relatives, even their father, were more important than some stupid papers o diplomas  
.  
Emanuela tries her best, but deep in her heart she wants to get out of here. She dreams about being like these young American ladies: free, unlimited with some stupid tradition which was making her value even less valuable, if it is even possible.

She can write a book about how much life in Cuba can suck ass. She hates generalizing, but it cannot be avoided in this case: adult men in this country shouldn’t have the right to call themselves ‘citizens’ or not even ‘people’. They reduce women’s presence to some sort of ‘thing’ at worst or their personal servants at best. Yelling at them in the streets or treating them as their own property are on a daily basis, but no woman has enough courage to oppose this state of affairs.

Emanuela comes back home at early morning on Saturday, after another prolonged shift. She internally prays that it will lead to gaining at least a little bit money. A man who’s the hotel’s owner seems to be very nice, older guy, so she assumes she has nothing to worry about.

She tiredly falls on a couch and starts to brutally push all protruding springs back to the mattress, well, at least she tries. Her family doesn’t have any money anymore, no matter how hard they try, there’s always something they’re lacking. Their house is truly microscopic, kids are stuffed in one, tiny room, and parents sleep beside on some blankets placed on the floor. A bed would consume too much space, but anyways, they still can’t even afford it.

The girl loves her family, but she’s slowly starting to be done with this not really good, nicely said, situation.

“Mierda!” She whisper curses, making sure her parents won’t hear. She knows that swearing in the Christian household is not welcome, but she reached that point in her life when she just has enough of everything.

She breathes heavily as she stands up to get to the old gas stove and eat two spoonfuls of paella straight from the pan, as it was all left after dinner. These all little things bring up all the nostalgia she’s hiding deep in her mind. The memories of the younger her fighting with her siblings about food come back a little foggy, though she can still see them rather fine. Sometimes she just wants to go back to the times when she didn’t have to worry about anything, when her life wasn’t complicated at all.

Emanuela has to make a decision and she does that sitting on cold kitchen tiles with colorful pattern. She knows she has no time left to think about it; maybe she should've talked to her parents first, but she took just enough time from them already, so she decides just now. All of her dreams fly far away as she knows she lost the only chance she had. The dreams about college, greater life, quicker moving out. Now the only thing that matters are her closest relatives and making their life better again.

That’s when a few tears start falling down her cheeks. She curses quietly when she realizes what she’s gotten herself into. She feels pathetic as never before and she’s got this feeling that cold, night wind pokes her painfully right in her exposed shoulders, one needle after another. Colorful curtains wave because of the draft created by on open window. She recalls the time, when she was hanging said curtains with her mother and younger sister.

This one memory hits her like a train; she was eight, her sister five and they were going to the market. Their mother said they needed to get some necessary things from there. They didn’t plan on buying any sort of decorations, but Maya spotted the curtains that looked almost the same as the ones she saw in abuela’s house. The was begging her mother for ten minutes or so and she could’ve done it much longer, but María decided to agree. Emanuela stood at the side, staring shyly at the whole situation, but at the same time she couldn’t stop the smile growing on her face. She enjoyed that her sister was happy, even if it was because of this trivial thing.

The girl brutally returns to the reality. She shouldn’t overthink things that happened in her past, but sometimes she just can’t help it. She’s ready to tell her decision to the family, she just has to wait until they all wake up. She hopes that she won’t let anyone down no more, because it’s definitely not what’s it all about.

Hours, surprisingly, pass more like minutes and in a blink of an eye it’s already eight in the morning and the whole family is sat by the table and ready to eat breakfast, if you can even call this thing an actual ‘breakfast’. There’s not enough food even for three people, so what about six, from which four are still kids.

“Mom, Dad, I have to tell you something,” she stands up, placing her hands heavily on the wooden table top. She can do this, it’s nothing hard, she rehearsed this so many times in front of the mirror. However, when she opens her mouth her voice is stuck inside her throat and Emanuela starts to worry that it’s not gonna work. Her hands began to shake, she has no idea how to calm herself down for now, but she knows she can’t give up, it’s already too late.

“I’ll go to work, I’ll take care of kids,” she hesitantly points her finger at the youngest two, who stared at her deeply. “I’ll help you take care of the house, I’ll give up on school.”

Nobody says anything, but Emanuela sees her mother’s face soften, as if someone moved an enormous load off of her shoulders. It makes the girl believe that she made the right decision. Finally, a woman starts to look like herself before the whole lack of money situation.

María has always been unimaginably beautiful. Tanned, caramel-like skin along with long, curly hair in a shade close to burnt coffee. Some dark freckles (which younger kids inherited from her) could be seen on the bridge of her nose, as well as her cheeks when the sun illuminated her face. She’s got her eyes from her father, unbelievably blue; her husband always said that they look like the ocean they could see from their house. María has always been rather short, but it didn’t really bother her. In her household she was taught to accept the way she looks like and she didn’t want to argue with that.

But now María’s face looks completely different. Tired glance lost its old glow and color; ocean blue turned into faded grey. Wrinkles make her face look overworked, making her older than she really is. Even her hands are tired, chapped from doing the laundry on a grater. She used to make a living only from this, but she still doesn’t feel worse because of it, even though her whole body is aching and she pays physical work’s price.

Emanuela’s smile grows wide as the whole family embrace her tightly. She still feels brutal doubts in the back of her mind, she can’t deal with the fact that everything’s gonna change. She still hates this place, but there is her home, her family and she has to take care of them, not some stupid plans of her.

She sees clearly that her parents are extremely proud of their daughter, who decided to continue her home country’s tradition.

  


But apparently, nothing works as planned in Emanuela’s life. She’s already eighteen, getting ready for her own marriage. Her mother runs around her for three hours, trying to prepare her to the most important day in her life. Emanuela doesn’t get what this whole notability is for. The only things that matters to her is the boy with whom she decided to be, not the whole overrated sheath. She happened to overhear her classmates talking about their dream weddings, gesturing rapidly. Even now, when she’s only a couple of hours from this amazing event, she still struggles understanding the whole seriousness.

“You look awesome!” María exclaims while clapping her hands. She’s never thought her daughter will get married this soon, but she can’t say she’s not happy about this. Everything seems to be finally getting in place and the older woman cannot feel better now.

Emanuela tries as hard as she can, but she just stopped caring about all the stuff minus her soon-to-be husband. Her a little bit fake friends stand in front of the house, screeching something about the lovey dovey stuff that’s about to happen. Varadero is not a particularly big city, so after an hour at best their whole neighborhood already knows about Emanuela’s marriage.

She stands here, ready for her father to come and walk her into the sanctuary. Her hair flows at the wind, probably ruining the hairstyle her mother’s friend worked so hard on. But again, that’s not Emanuela’s point. She exhales slowly, her dad is late. She could never actually see it coming, though it hurts her a little bit. Everyone’s waiting inside, looking back to see if the bride is coming, but surprisingly, she isn’t. Emanuela’s pretty sure that some time after the event, everyone will bring up her marriage as a synonym of an absolute failure.

Dad comes to her, finally, a sorry look in his eyes. The flower in small pocket on his chest is messed up, Emanuela has to quickly fix it. Even though she wants, she just can’t be mad at him. Work stopped him and it was nothing he could do about it. Still, he looks amazing in dark grey tux with a red tie. They spent way too much time picking the right outfit, but that’s the part that Emanuela really cares about. Her dad’s happy with his look, which means she is too. Her family’s happiness comes before everything else.

Emanuela’s smile widen as dad grabs her hand, walking inside. His other arm behind his back, she can’t help thinking that he looks like the king, similar to those they taught her about in high school. But no, recalling school is not gonna make this day worse, so she erases all the unpleasing thoughts, focusing completely at the boy right in front of her.

He’s twenty, tall and handsome, his eyes sparkle more than she could’ve ever imagined. His chocolate locks, now straightened, are brushed to one side of his head, but still, a few little curls fall right on his forehead. Diego’s got his famous smirk plastered to his face, showing his perfectly white teeth. Yes, his looks are one of many, really many reasons Emanuela’s fallen for him.

He’s wearing a dark blue tux, even though he personally wanted the baby blue one, but his sister convinced him the darker one will do better. Nobody’d ever worn light-colored tuxedos on their wedding, and she didn’t think such an old-fashioned country, which Cuba was, was actually ready for this anomaly. He has one, small flower on his wrist, which looks exactly like he was going to prom, the party he’ll never have an opportunity to attend.

He watches his fianceé walk, as her father lets go right before they enter the small stairs. That’s where Emanuela’s childhood permanently disappears. She’s about to change her life completely, soon she’ll have her own family and she’ll no longer be considered a kid.

They intertwine their fingers, both not fully ready for what’s about to happen. They have love in their eyes, but it’s too early, they know it, but there’s no turning back now. Thing will sort out, eventually, later. They make a promise, don’t even following the priest’s words. Their marriage shouldn’t be based on some sort of formula everyone repeats, it’s their love and their own words.

And it’s over. The ceremony lasts thirty minutes at best, everyone’s crying, but Emanuela doesn’t even see them anymore. She’s still scared to the point her knees are weak and shaky, but, after all, what can really go wrong?

  


It’s been some, kind of, difficult times. Emanuela and Diego are in their early thirties, having already five kids. The youngest one, named Leandro, is only one month old right now, but Emanuela can’t even have proper care of her son. She’s forced to clean the dishes in one restaurant nearby, maternity leave is not a thing there. Fortunately, Maya is ready for help whenever Emanuela asks for it and she’s sure that her sister’s an actual angel.

Their house is extremely small, though still a little bigger than their parents’ one. It’s not enough for seven people, especially for one being still a baby. Emanuela struggles with keeping her family’s well-being stable, but she knows she’s doing everything she can. There’s one thing she doesn’t want her kids to experience: her own life. She can’t say it was bad, but it wasn’t the best either. She had to make many decisions, one worse than another, and she wishes her children would never have to do it, too. That’s why she’s always taking night shifts barely gets help from the oldest kids. Emanuela doesn’t want them involved, they have school and their own future to care about, she’s an adult, which means she can manage on her own.

It’s Saturday, meaning Emanuela’s day off. She’s got it, because she’s done all her work quicker than anybody before her, so her boss decided it would be fair to give her a break. Diego slams the door open, finding Luis, his oldest kid, walking around the living room with Leandro in his arms. They’re not perfect, but that’s the kind of family he’d always wanted to have.

“I’ve got news!” He yells proudly, holding some paper in his hand.

Emanuela freezes on a couch, letting one shaky breath escape her lips. She wishes she was happy, but many unpleasant thoughts refuse to leave her mind. That’s why she just waits until her husbands decides to speak again.

“I’ve got a job! In America!” Words hit the whole family like a truck, Luis tries hard not to drop Leandro and little Rachel begins to dance on the colorful carpet. That’s it, that’s the relief. These were the words Emanuela wanted to hear her whole life, but never did. Never, well, until now.

“We’ve gotta pack our essentials. The flight is tomorrow at nine,” Diego continues, followed by happy shouts and giggles of his kids. Now he knows their life is finally gonna be better than it was before.

“Mom! Mom, we’re moving!” Emanuela shouts to the phone. “To America, yeah! It’ll be alright, don’t worry, we’ve got this! Sí, sí, goodbye!” She hangs up, breathing heavily. She laughs loudly, still refusing to believe that it’s actually true.

  


The day passes in the blink of an eye and suddenly, the whole family is at the airport, parents and older kids crying and saying goodbye to their home country. It may be a little bit (a lot, actually) screwed up, but still, that’s the place when they were born and grew up, well, most of them.

The flight to Fort Lauderdale in Florida takes only around one hour, so they’re packed up in two taxis not so later after taking on the plane. House they’re given is literally enormous and Emanuela really wants to thank Diego’s boss for everything he’d done for her family. Some time before all of the stuff happening was out of their reach, and now it’s simply becoming their new life.

The inside of the house was designed to look like the Cuban ones, so they can feel more like home. It has two floor, each of them bigger than any house Emanuela’s seen in her whole life. It’s colorful and exposed to sun from every angle, so they’ll be able to save money by not turning on the lights for the whole day. Living room is almost copied from Emanuela’s mother’s house. Though it holds some bad memories, she still loves it and she’d glad she’ll have a hint of it in her new life.

She holds Leandro, or, Lance, as they came up with still inside of the plane, on her hip, watching the others unpack their things. The neighborhood is rather quiet, perfect for raising children in the America, she would say. She tries to pay attention to everything she can, living her teenage dreams just now. The weather is perfect, everything is.

Suddenly, their neighbor comes out from her house. She stands, leaning against her fence, smiling. Emanuela, being the loyal wife she is, still has to admit that the woman is beautiful. More precisely, breathtaking. She’s got a long braid of shiny, dark coffee-colored hair, a little bit messy, but pretty. Her complexion is a bit tanned, but not even close to Emanuela’s skin. She’s dressed in a knee-length, yellow dress, making her look like some sort of a princess.

“Hey, you must be our new neighbors!” She reaches out her hand and waits until Emanuela grabs and shakes it. She watches a man coming out of the neighbors’ house, looking fine just like the women in front of him. “I’m Anne, and that’s my husband, Nick,” she quickly introduces herself. Dios mio, that’s what you call a flawless couple. Emanuela didn’t even know they existed, but, apparently, they do and they’re standing right there.

“D’ya have kids?” Rachel, a lovely two-years-old, runs to her mother and stares at her neighbors with sparkling eyes. She tries English as hard as she can, but still, her words sound funny and definitely not so American.

“No, but we’re about to have,” Anne explains quickly, listening to Luis calling Rachel to come pick which room she’s gonna sleep in. “We’ve just finished filling in our adoption papers,” she adds, when the kid is no longer near them. “It’s been a long and tiring process, but soon we’re picking up our new son!” She smiles, and Emanuela thinks it’s one of the prettiest smiles she’s ever seen. It’s good to see people happy and even better if they’re gonna be living door-to-door with you, probably for the rest of your life.

Anne isn’t finished yet, but Emanuela’s not going to stop her. She seems pretty excited for the child and nobody has the right to take her happiness away.

“His name’s Keith and he’s around you kid’s age,” she points at Lance, now asleep and cuddled into Emanuela’s neck. “I hope they’d get along, your family seems like a nice one.”

“Oh, I hope so, too! It’ll be awesome to have a kid his age so close!” Emanuela recalls that she’s holding a baby right in time, milliseconds before she starts clapping her hands.

Her son will have a friend here, it may seem weird to set up a friendship like this, but it’s actually unavoidable. They’ll be living next door to each other, there for sure will be some situations when they’ll be forced to have some contact. Knowing each other will be a thing for sure, and it may as well come with friendship sooner or later.

☆° ◆ ～ ◆ °☆

  
It’s been three years since they moved to America, Lance is now three years old and definitely ready for his first day in the pre-kindergarten. He needs it in order to catch up with English and to try and socialize with American toddlers. Plus, it’s a nice way to play around and simply have a good time. Emanuela has a newborn, Jorge, to look after, so it’s great to have others care for her second younger son for her.

At seven in the morning Lance sprints to his parents’ bedroom, followed by Veronica’s shouting, something like “Cuidado, Leandro!”, but he doesn’t really mind that. He’s just excited and ready to go now, even though nobody else is. He jumps into his parents’ bed, laughing loudly, but not too loud, so he doesn’t wake Jorge up. He may be just a child, but he’s quite smart still.

“I’m weady, mamá!” He exclaims right into Emanuela’s ear. She giggles when she hears her son’s, well, quite bad pronunciation.

“It’s ‘ready’, Leandro. Look, r–e–a–d–y,” she spells the word after she calmed her breath down enough to talk. She’s trying hard every day to make her son’s words sound better, but that’s hard, because he’s got a little lisp as well as a gap in between his incisors.

“Mamá, hurry! I wanna meet new fwiends here!” She can’t help it but laugh at the way he cannot pronounce the ‘r’ sound right in a few words.

They run to the living room, Lance almost falling down the stairs. Emanuela has to hold him by the hand so she’s completely sure he doesn’t hurt himself. Well, it wouldn’t be great to go to the ER instead of pre-school, especially for Lance.

He sits by the table, looking at Luis with sparkling eyes. A fifteen year old boy is trying not to laugh, but it’s literally impossible when you’re watching excited Lance. He’s constantly jumping on his chair, almost spilling the milk from his bowl. Because, well, he’s a kid, but he knows milk comes before cereal, even if his older siblings seem to disagree. Still, Jorge being only three months old is way too enthusiastic when he sees Lance’s cereal and doesn’t give a single damn when Veronica shows him her own ones. Lance always yells that Jorge’s his team, even though the baby probably doesn’t even know what’s the difference. It’s still four to two for the cereal before milk team. That’s weird, indeed, but at least their family’s working rather well.

“Mamá, can we pwease go?” Lance shouts at his mother, who’s currently trying to fix five years old Rachel’s sweater. Her head got stuck in one of the sleeves and Emanuela doesn’t want to know how even she managed to do it.

“Leandro, you’re three, how come you can’t speak properly?” Marco, who’s thirteen now, asks with a single laugh. Mom keeps telling him that when he was younger he was talking perfectly fine, that’s why he can’t help but tease Lance about this.

“I can! Ya’re just using hard words!” Lance pouts, throwing his plastic blue spoon at Marco.

“It’s you are, not ‘ya’re’, whatever that’s supposed to mean,” Marco stands up, then throws his dirty dishes in a dishwasher. That’s a better way of cleaning, because Emanuela kept saying she doesn’t want to spend hours on washing the dishes.

“Are you ready, Lance?” Emanuela asks after she finally manages to fix Rachel. She starts kindergarten this day, but Diego will drive her later. Speaking of him, he’s walking down the stairs right now, with his morning, messed up hair, trying to understand why the hell is the whole family yelling.

Lance is ready, or, well, he would be ready if he didn’t forget about all the stuff he’s supposed to bring. He starts running in the whole house, first grabbing his little red bag, which is his last birthday’s present from Anne. Veronica helped him pack all the essentials the day before, but he ended up throwing it all out, that’s why now he’s desperately trying to find everything he needs.

Then, he realizes his little blue lion plushie went missing and it quickly becomes the whole family’s emergency. It’s a well-known fact that Lance won’t go anywhere without this one particular toy. It holds so many memories, even though he owns it only for a year. He went to the store with his mom, Keith and Anne, and when they saw these plushies it was impossible to take the boys away without buying them. It quickly became some sort of Lance’s talisman, his luck stored in a little toy, and he couldn’t imagine losing it, not after leaving it in one of the shops in the mall. Fortunately, the workers were nice and kept his lion safe until he returned with his mom. It’s an impossibly funny story for his siblings, except Rachel, who was crying with him when she heard what happened.

“Mom, I’m not going anywhere without Bwue!” He cries out, desperately trying to find the toy. He’s searching everywhere, but apparently Blue is nowhere to be found. Rachel’s close to crying again and her mother has to try to comfort her, which is even working, but she has to stay and cuddle her little daughter.

“Luis took it!” Oh no, that’s the point when Lance is a panicking mess, blaming everyone but himself. Luis looks at him, deeply offended, as if Lance just said that his brother murdered someone.

“Why would _I_ , out of all the people here, take your toy?” He knows he shouldn’t be mad at his little brother, but he can be a huge pain in the ass when he’s nervous. And right know, Lance is even more than just nervous, so Luis tries hard not to lose it.

“For your girlfwend!” That’s the word Lance likes the most, but he still can’t manage to say it right. “I know she likes pwesents!”

“Yeah, she likes them, but that doesn’t mean I took Blue!” Luis throws his hands in the air, trying to get Lance’s logic, and he’s, well, failing.

“I found it!” Veronica exclaims, holding Blue in one hand. She’s usually the family’s savior, Emanuela likes to joke that she’s the best kid, but that’s the statement everyone agrees about.

“Bwue!” Lance grabs his plushie and his bag, now ready to head to his classes. He calmly walks to the door, letting his mom tie his shoes, because when he tries on his own, they have to cut the lances as it’s impossible to untie them. He wears an old, Rachel’s blue hoodie, which is apparently a little too big, but once Keith told him it’s nice, so he’s gonna wear it as much as he can.

They get in the car, Lance is sat on a child car seat, but of course, he calls shotgun, so Emanuela has to move his seat to the front. It’s silly, but she still can’t believe she has her own driving licence. In Cuba it was nearly impossible to do so, as cars were men thing and it wasn’t acceptable for women to try and get their license. Most of driving schools didn’t even accept girls to them, saying something like “go to your house and have kids”. Emanuela’s still happy about living in America, because this country is different, better. They all have more freedom, she can finally be who she always wanted to be.

The ride doesn’t take long, five minutes at best, they could’ve walked, but it’s a literal nightmare to try and convince Lance to walk longer than to the nearest shop. It actually started when Nick took him on a ride and Lance liked it that much he refused to walk completely, even at home, which was, like, funny squared. He’s been yelling at his whole family to come and at least give him a piggyback ride, as it “feels like uncle Nick’s car”, apparently. It actually wasn’t similar at all, but him as a 2-year-old didn’t really get the difference.

They finally manage to get out of the car, which Lance does after a solid ten minutes long argument with his mother. Yes, he’s fond of meeting new friends, driving still seems like a better idea. Emanuela doesn’t want to yell at him, but she’s afraid that the situation is forcing her to. Some people the driveway are looking at her, kneeling by the car and trying to convince her son to come out. It looks like she’s having a real serious, business conversation with her three-year-old and a few parents stare at the situation with lovely smiles. They’ve all been through this, so seeing someone struggling the same as they did brings some good nostalgia feeling.

Lance finally decides it will be good to agree with his mother and follow her in the direction of the building. It looks like a very big house, painted all yellow on the outside. That’s a bit strange, as it doesn’t really belong to quite the big city that Fort Lauderdale is. It may not be the center of this city, but still, a house like that should be probably standing somewhere in the suburbs or, at least, in a smaller town, maybe like Mason, Ohio. The curtains that are in a warm white tone are seen in the windows, making the place look even more friendly. It reminds Lance of home, plus, it has a playground, so it cannot be that bad, right?

“Bye, mamá!” He says when she’s done helping him change his outside shoes to the ones he’ll be supposed to wear inside. It met with some disagreement of Lance, as she made him put on some ugly grey ones and didn’t let him stay in his beloved, blue little sneakers. But, hey, it’s time to make some friends, so he decides not to worry about his shoes anymore. Who even cares about shoes’ color there in the kindergarten?

He walks to the door and stands right in front of it, not particularly sure what the should do now. He’s never been in such place before and he has no idea how to act. He usually doesn’t care much, but this building is something completely new and he still, even though he’s only three, wants to make a good first impression.

“Mamá, should I knock?” He turns to his mother, who immediately stops in the middle of her way to the exit door. She smiles, grabbing car keys from her sweater’s pocket.

“Just enter!” It’s actually weird to hear her say that. Lance was always taught to knock first, but now she just tells him to come in without any invitation.

He hesitates for a bit, watching his mother waving goodbye. He doesn’t want her to leave him here, but the thought of meeting new kids once again takes control of his brain. He places one of his chubby palms on the wooden door and pushes it open.

Lance is suddenly attacked with kids’ shouting and giggling, but before he fully enters the room, he bumps into something, which actually happens to be a woman. She’s quite young, her early twenties probably and has amazing, wavy and blonde hair she puts up in a little bun. She’s wearing a baby blue apron with her name written on it, but Lance doesn’t know what it says, he’s not the best at reading. The girl’s smile widen as she kneels down to be Lance’s height. She’s tall, at least for Lance, but she’s not intimidating at all, more like sweet. She also seems nice, a cute blush forming on her face, probably caused by playing with kids in the room.

“Buenos días! Leandro, right?” She smiles kindly, offering her hand to shake. She likes to make kids feel like they’re equal to her by acting towards them the way she’s doing towards adults, maybe with more cooing and sweeter voice, but everything else is the same.

“Lance, that’s me!” He shakes her hand a little confused, as he doesn’t meet this kind of behavior often. He’s also wondering how she happens to know Spanish words. This girl does not look Latina at all, she’s rather pale and her American accent is quite heavy, she cannot be mistaken, unlike Lance’s older siblings.

He quietly follows the girl inside, mesmerized by everything in this room. It’s big, probably bigger than his house’s living room, which is the biggest one he’s ever seen. Also, the amount of toys stored in here is unbelievable, they’re everywhere. He squeezes Blue a little tighter, as if he’s scared she may get lost there. His feet brush against the furry carpet lying on the floor as he tries to reach everything in only a singular eyesight.

Then, suddenly, he bumps into the second thing this day, and this time it’s a little, chubby Samoan kid, probably around his age. The boy is impossibly cute, dark skin and even darker hair with bangs split up on two opposite sides of his forehead. He’s wearing an orange bandana on his head, which holds his hair from falling right into his face. He looks a bit shy and flustered, quietly examining Lance with his eyes. The shy impression erases quickly as the boy speaks.

“Hey, I’m Hunk!” He opens up his arms for a hud and Lance falls in his arms immediately. He’s always touch starved, even though his family cuddles with him all the time.

“I’m Lance, ya new here, too?” Lance tries to keep his English up, but this kid probably doesn’t care about it. They’re only children, after all.

“Yes, it’s my first day! Let’s go meet my friend!” He exclaims happily, grabbing Lance’s hand and leaning him to one of a few tables in the left corner of the room. Lance is quite impressed that Hunk can actually say ‘friends’ right, because for him, this word in an absolute nightmare.

“Katie, this is Lance, he’s our new friend!” Hunk says as they reach the table. Little butterscotch haired girl looks at Lance for a minute or two, transferring her attention to him from the blocks construction she’s been building before the boys arrived.

“She’s small, I love her!” Lance claps his hands, entertained that he’s already made two friends.

Katie is one year younger than Hunk and Lance, but this playgroup has kids from one and a half up to four years old, so it’s nothing unusual here. She’s smart for a two-years-old she is, her playing ideas are absolutely the best. Right now, she’s trying to explain the new game she’s come up with, but Lance notices someone in the other corner of the room.

  


“Hey, let’s go see my fwiend, guys!” He shouts at his new mates, making the ‘follow me’ sign with his hand. They immediately go after him, only to realize that the person he was talking about is a small, dark-haired boy standing here with a small pout, holding tightly to his red lion plushie.

“Keef!” Lance runs to hug him, and Keith is suddenly relieved. Seeing a familiar face makes him feel a lot better. The teacher is nice, but she’s a new, unknown person, so she doesn’t have the vibe Lance has.

“Why are you here so early?” There still aren’t many kids and Lance has seen Hunk and Katie enter the room, but not Keith, so it’s safe to assume that he’s been there for quite some time now.

“Mommy has a meeting…” He answers hesitantly, watching Katie and Hunk, who’s been standing behind Lance the whole time. “Who are they?” He’s clearly confused, but Lance notices something more on his friend’s face. He looks… a little upset?

“Oh, yeah! Hunk and Katie, they’re our new fwiends, do you like it?” He asks, visibly excited about having some other kids to play with.

Keith is not completely sure whether he likes it or not, but if Lance like these people, they cannot be bad, right? Lance is an amazing human, a perfect and flawless one, even, so his choices are always the rules to Keith.

  


They turn out to be pretty cool, Keith has to admit it. Hunk is adorable beyond anything, also very cuddly, but not as much as Lance when he’s around the little Kogane. Also, he can read, so when the teacher is busy with younger kids, they all sit down on the carpet and listen to Hunk’s sweet voice. It still cracks sometimes when he struggles with pronunciation, but still, he can say ‘friend’ properly! That’s the point Lance will always bring up, no matter what the others say, even if it doesn’t fit into the conversation or when there’s really no need to say that.

Once Hunk, Lance and Keith are playing, Katie stands up and runs to the teacher, who’s currently sorting the books in the shelf.

“Um, miss…?” She’s a bit of shy around adults, especially those she doesn’t know really well. But the idea that has been floating in her head for quite some time now involves this particular woman, so Katie has to overcome her fear.

“What is it, princess?” She squats to be the little girl’s height. Also, she loves giving her pupils cute pet names, she thinks it makes her bond with them stronger and it’s a child way to refer to others, just like adults do with “Mister” or “Missus”.

“Can we have a… a wedieng… today?” She struggles with saying the word correctly, but apparently the woman understands her perfectly. Katie’s eyes are wide open and sparkling while she’s saying that, which is simply adorable.

“I think the word you’re searching for is ‘wedding’, Katie,” she holds back a laugh and continues. “Of course we can, darling, who’s getting married now?”

Katie exhales and throws her hands in the air. “Lance and Keef!” She shouts, pointing at the boys.

Hunk, right now, is making flowers from colorful tissue-paper and putting them in his friends’ hair. He's actually great at handmade stuff, probably because his mother does a lot of those. Another girl from their group is trying to braid Keith’s hair, it turns out really messy, but at least he’s got a cute little bun now.

Katie and the teacher make their way to them, sitting in front of them. Katie is excited to the point she starts shaking, but the teacher just smiles and looks at Lance and Keith.

“Okay, boys, are you ready?” She asks, even though she can see they are.

They both hold hands tightly, Blue and Red lying on their lap, so they don’t disturb the wedding. The boys both yell “Yeah!” and wait patiently for the woman to start the whole marriage ceremony.

“Okay, so Lance, do you take Keith here to be your beloved husband and promise to stand by his side every day?” She doesn’t want to add “till the death do you part”, as they are only kids and it may be inappropriate in this situation.

“Yes, I do!” Lance squeezes Keith’s hand and waits for the second part.

“Well, do you, Keith, take Lance as your lovely husband and promise to love him every day?” She changes the words to suit the boys better.

“I do,” Keith chuckles, looking Lance in the eyes.

Now comes the best part. Katie has been to the wedding only a month ago, so she knows exactly what it will be and it makes her even more excited than she was before.

“You may now kiss the groom,” Lance has no idea what the word ‘groom’ means, but he leans slightly to press a soft kiss against Keith’s cheek. He looks like he’s glowing, it’s visible that he’s happier than ever. He kissed Keith the same way he saw Luis do with his girlfriend, whenever she leaves their house.

It’s time to go home and Emanuela comes to pick up both Lance and Keith. She sees her son is clearly amused about something, but he refuses to say what this thing is. In the car he’s awfully quiet, which makes Emanuela concerned, as he never shuts up. It leaves her wondering until they park the car on Serrano household’s driveway.

Lance jumps out of the car, holding Keith’s palm with one of his hands, the other one squeezing Blue. Emanuela follows them to the house and watches her son slam the door open. Apparently, Luis must’ve forgotten to lock them, again. But she’s not mad, her husband’s home, so she’s nothing to worry about.

“Hey, I got married with Keef!” Lance suddenly bursts out, standing in the middle of the living room, raising their intertwined fingers as a proof for his words.

Emanuela can’t help it but laugh, because her son literally yelled it right at everyone’s face. That’s adorable and once again she’s grateful her second youngest son can live his best life in America.

She loves her life even more and wishes for it to always stay the same way. That’s it now, that’s her dream coming true, her perfect life finally becoming her reality.

☆° ◆ ～ ◆ °☆

Lance turned six about a month ago, which means he’s starting his first grade in primary school just now. He’s thinking about his newborn sister, Sophie, as he stands in front of Keith's door. It’s their first year of school and Lance is anxious as he’s never been before. It’s a new thing for him, but his nervousness passes as he recalls his older siblings’ words.

They tended to tell him how amazing primary is, how cool learning is. They told him a lot about activity clubs and he hopes he’ll find the perfect one for himself.

“Primary is the best time in your life!” They said that everyday during summer break.

They were right, at least that’s what Lance thinks. Well, they’re his siblings after all, they cannot be wrong. He admires them dearly, there’s no way they would even be lying to him. They’re not this type of people, his whole family isn’t, so there’s nothing to worry about.

He’s waiting for Keith to come out and he really hopes that his friend didn’t oversleep. He learnt in his short life that it happens a lot, Keith tends to sleep to one in the afternoon, if not longer, if he ever catches the opportunity to do so. His parents have to come up with many, many ways of waking him up, as each new one works only for about a week, then his organism learns how to ignore it and it's not longer effective. It’s seven twenty right now, so they still have forty minutes before their first period starts, but they were told to come earlier, at least five minutes. The walk to school will take them ten minutes at best, but if Keith doesn’t come in a few they might be late! And Lance doesn't want that, he wants to see everything before they actually start learning.

There he is. Keith stands on the stairs, readjusting his backpack’s belts to match his shoulders. He’s got Red in the small pocket of his bag, tucked in so nobody sees her. He has in mind that it’s not manly anymore to have your toys with you, even if Lance thinks otherwise. He always carries Blue with him and is definitely proud of it. That’s his best friend after all, well, after Keith, Hunk and Katie.

Lance is only a kid, but at the same time a very observant one. Keith is gorgeous and Lance doesn’t know how blind you have to be not to see this. His skin is pale compared to Lance, but not sickly pale. He’s got some nice tan after the summer break, but it’s still far away from Lance’s caramel complexion. Keith’s hair curls at the ends, making him look even more adorable than he already is. It’s long enough to put in a little ponytail, but Keith refuses to let it happen, as ponytails are considered ‘girly’. Nobody thinks that, but Keith is stubborn and will not make anyone change his mind. Besides, Keith’s cute. Even when he’s angry or yelling at some kids, with a reason or without it, he’s still impossibly sweet. Also, he’s a caring kid, but nobody other than his friends know it. If they told it to anyone, they’d hardly believe it, or even not at all.

“Hey!” Lance greets him, smiling and hugging his friend tightly.

They start walking to school and it’s perfectly fine, until Keith starts kicking every little pebble on his way. His expression changes from a smile to a little pout, funny to be seen on a six-years-old’s face.

“What’s wrong?” Lance asks, pressing Blue against his friend’s chest. The lions help them cope with emotions, but Lance knows Keith prefers Blue to deal with his anger as she reminds him of Lance.

“I don’t want to go to school!” He exclaims loudly, grabbing Blue from Lance’s hands and hugging her tightly.

He promised himself he won’t admit he doesn’t feel like learning now, but who cares, to be honest? It’s just him and Lance and they never lie to each other, nothing can go wrong.

“What? Why? It’ll be fun!” Lance really doesn’t understand his friend’s behavior. He started to be very weird now and he doesn’t see any particular reason why.

“I don’t wanna learn some crap, I’d like to spend time with you instead!” He shouts, angry tears forming in the corners of his eyes.

He hates crying, but he’s an emotional kid and there’s no way to deny it. He watches Lance laugh as his eyes sparkle even more than they did before. Lance is pretty when he smiles, and he always smiles, which means he’s always pretty.

“Silly Keith! You’ll be spending time with me, we’re in the same class!” Lance claps his hands and leads Keith to school.

These words relieve Keith, because at least he’ll be able to look at Lance the whole day. It wasn’t really possible during the summer break, as Lance was always travelling somewhere with his family.

First two weeks, they flew to Cuba in order to see his grandparents, but they stayed here almost a week longer than expected and it made Keith furious. They always wanted to keep Lance away from him! Why else would they drag him everywhere, knowing the place he likes best is Fort Lauderdale with Keith?

Then they went to Mexico to meet his dad’s friends. Lance was at home for two days before he left again, he spent both of them with Keith, but it wasn’t enough. Keith wanted to have Lance for himself, he still does. Lance couldn’t phone his friends from the places he’s been visiting, so they stayed out of touch for the first month.

The next month was easier as Lance was only absent for a week, so it equaled something like three weeks full of playing with his friends. The time was never enough, but after all, Keith didn’t have any right to complain about that.

The building they’re standing right in front of is huge, a lot bigger than their kindergarten. Walls painted white, large windows with lots of stickers on them. It was pretty modern, probably renovated lately. It makes Lance gasp in shock, he never got used to bigger buildings. He gets Blue from Keith’s hands and after he’s done putting her back in his bag, they enter the school.

Many kids are here with their parents, but not Keith and Lance. They’re old enough to walk on their own, as school isn’t far away and they don’t even have to cross the street to get here. Lance spots Katie and Hunk standing by the board, ready to head to their first period. They have papers with some labels on them, but they’re too far away, so Lance is unable to read what they say.

“Hunk, Katie!” He shouts instead, grabbing Keith’s hand and starting to maneuver between all the people here.

They reach their friends quickly, though Lance almost feel down after bumping on some second graders. He focuses on Hunk’s paper, labeled as ‘1-C’ with his schedule right under it.

“No way! You're 1-C too? That's where and Keith are!” Lance starts jumping around. “Katie, show me your card!”, He orders, grabbing it from little girl’s hands.

“1-C as well,” she answers, then gestures ‘follow me’ and starts climbing the stairs.

They get to classroom labeled as ‘116’ and Lance wonders how many are there actually. If they reach one hundred already, this school must be even bigger than it appears to be! But that’s not Lance’s biggest problem right now. He’s chatting with Hunk and Katie, who seem to be as excited as he is. Katie says her brother, Matt is in fifth grade and in one year he’ll be graduating to middle school. She talks about him a lot, he’s someone like her mentor and she wants to study hard to be just like him. He also thinks primary is the best, so she wants to live her best life now, when she’s not studying, of course.

Hunk is his adorable self as always, rambling even more than he usually does, if it’s possible. He sits down on the carpet set in the middle of the classroom and watches the other kids enter the room as they’re all waiting for the teacher to appear. Lance, still talking, tries to hold back his excitement as it may be very weird to those who are not experienced with him. He shouts a lot and tends to hug random people, but right now he’s just plastered to Keith’s side.

Keith is, lightly said, not pleased with the situation. He likes the fact that Katie and Hunk are here with them, but school still doesn’t seem like the best idea. He wants to spend some time with Lance only, Hunk and Katie will do as well, but not the bunch of other, unknown kids. When the teacher enters, it becomes something similar to hell on Earth.

She’s talking so loudly and Keith seems to be the only one who’s not happy with it. Every other kid is having many questions, raising their hands and asking a lot, even Lance. He wants to know everything, and his voice is filled with excitement and happiness. He’s the only one lightening up Keith’s day, to be honest.

Keith leans on Lance’s shoulder, half asleep as his parents made him wake up early in the morning. Everyone knows it’s hard to make Keith function properly before ten and his current behavior is a pure proof of this state. The teacher’s voice disappears right when Keith’s cheek hits Lance’s shoulder. He didn’t pay attention before, but now he’s sound asleep so it doesn’t matter anymore.

Today is just a ‘practice’ day, which means only teacher’s introduction, some talking and explaining their future periods, and it’s done. That’s good for everyone, because they don’t think it will be great to try and focus while you’re this excited, at least that’s Lance’s statement.

Keith suddenly feels some pressure on his shoulders and someone’s dragging him away from Lance. Well, if ‘away’ means like half a foot, then it is definitely very far away. His eyes are still shut when he began hearing two voices calling him. The third one is giggling in the background, but Keith’s ears are still adjusting and he’s not sure what he’s actually hearing.

“Keith, we’re going to see clubs, wake up!” Hunk happens to be the one shaking the other boy’s shoulder. He’s squatting in front of Keith, who’s now getting awake, sitting on the carpet and looking at the crowded room, as kids began to walk away.

“My God, come on!” Katie shouts at them, ready to head to the corridor.

Lance manages to stand up and help Keith do the same thing. He drags him to the board, one of many made especially for first graders who’s just started their journey with education. The one they’re standing near is not as crowded as the others, since it’s located at the very end of this corridor. That’s great, because Keith doesn’t like crowds and Lance doesn’t want to make his friend uncomfortable in any way.

Hunk, as the best reader of the group, begans reading all the clubs out loud, making sure his friends fully understand what he’s saying.

“And finally, the junior soccer team. It welcomes kids in between age six and—” He doesn’t even get to finish, because Lance interrupts him.

“My God, Keith, that’s you! You have to participate, you’re the best soccer player in the entire world! You just have to, Keith, are you even listening?” He bursts out suddenly.

Keith shakes and a grin is being plastered to his face, as Lance yelled it all so loudly and he’s starting to feel everyone’s eyes on them. One kid, who happens to walk behind them with his mother, looks at them confusingly, so Keith stares back, his eyes telling that kid to ‘get lost’. He’s quite intimidating for a child, but only when he’s angry and stressed, especially in situations like this one.

But Lance smiles and Keith cannot be mad anymore. He looks at him, only to lose everything in the other boy’s eyes. He’s ready to respond, but Lance starts talking again.

“Right, nope, I don’t like any of these,” he states, focusing his accent on the ‘r’ sound, making it appear more Spanish. “But, Keith! I’ll be at every practice of yours, promise!”

Keith guesses he has no other choice than sign up for this club, as Lance got excited for it. He cannot let him down now, not after Lance is so happy about the practice. But that’s true what he said, Keith likes soccer a lot, though he’s still a kid who never considered to play it more professionally. He often plays in his garden with Lance, who’s got grace and such, but still isn’t the best player. He tries hard, but he’s lacking some strength in legs which is actually necessary to be at least decent. But, as it was said before, it was only for fun, so Keith didn’t really pay attention to this. They were just enjoying it, simple as that, but now everything’s about to change.

“Here’s my mom. Let’s go, Katie!” Hunk points at a large, silver toyota parked beside the wall. They just got out of the building, meaning that Ms Garrett was here for quite some time now. She’s always earlier than expected, but willing to wait as long as the situation requires.

“Bye, guys!” Lance waves at his friends as they go to Ms Garrett’s car. He sits on the bench with Keith, thinking about something deeply. It’s probably nothing too serious, as he’s just a kid, probably just dinner at home, or Keith, or maybe… his mamá’s garlic knots, or Keith’s eyes, or… well, his thoughts are mainly focused on Keith.

“Are we walking or is your mom picking us up?” Keith asks, poking his friend’s shoulder.

“Mom told me she’ll pick us up, she should be there in a minute,” he doesn’t know, but she said she’ll be here right after their class is over, which should be just now.

He’s not wrong, her blue, seventies’ ford mustang parks in the driveway and Emanuela calls them to come in. After they do, she changes the radio station to the one with old, Latino music Lance likes the most. She actually grew up on it and is glad her kids enjoy it as much as she did back when she was younger.

“Mamá, today was cool! I love this school so much, Katie and Hunk are in our class!” He starts explaining his emotions, but Emanuela interrupts him quickly.

“Why don’t you let Keith speak for a while?”

Said boy shrugges, exhaling quietly.

“I… liked it,” he says hesitantly, as if he wasn’t actually so sure about that.

Lance bursts out laughing, pointing his finger towards Keith.

“Liar, Keithy! Mamá, he fell asleep during class!”

Keith would be embarrassed, but it was Lance. His Lance and his Lance’s family, which was pretty much his own one, too. He spends so much time in their house it can be considered his as well. His parents are not really complaining, they're happy their son has a friend and feels comfortable around someone.

After a five minute drive they reach Serranos’ house and again, Lance grabs Keith’s hand and they walk to the front door. He kicks it open, Emanuela clearly disapproves but says nothing, just being here and watching the boys. Lance enters the house to see Marco and Luis playing FIFA 16 on their PlayStation 3, Jorge trying to disturb them, Veronica and Rachel chatting about something on a couch and finally, his dad holding little Sophie in his arms.

“Listen, guys, Keith got into the school’s soccer team!” He announces it and his words meet with his whole family laughing. They can’t help it, as Lance sounds exactly like he was announcing his engagement with Keith. They wouldn’t be surprised if it happened when they are teenagers, but now they’re only six and it’s simply adorable.

“Stop laughing, Keith will be awesome! Luis, you played soccer, Keith will be as good as you!” Lance points at his oldest brother, who doesn’t even look back at him.

His dad speaks up instead, as if he just realized what is happening.

“What did I tell you about opening the door?” Yeah, kicking the door apparently isn’t the best way to open it, but who is here to blame? Everyone does it at some point, right?

“Diego, cariño, let him be. He was excited,” Emanuela excuses her son, placing her right palm on her husband’s shoulder, exposing the ring she’s always wearing.

“What does cariño mean?” Lance hears this word a lot, but never really asked about it. His eyes go from his mom to Keith and back.

“It’s ‘honey’ in Spanish, that’s what you call a person you love the most,” Diego explains quickly, giving Sophie to Emanuela, as little girl has just woken up.

“Oh, that’s nice! Keith’s my cariño then!” He squeezes said boy’s hand tightly, when his words cause a new outburst of laughter.

For six years old Lance, this is heaven and when he remembers they're going to Keith's first practice tomorrow, it's becoming even better.

☆° ◆ ～ ◆ °☆

  
Another day of six years old Lance is nothing unusual. He does the same things as every other day, but school still seems overly exciting to him. He’s got classes from eight to one in the afternoon, but a thing he just can’t wait for is Keith’s practice. They’re currently on their last period that day and Lance feels like his body’s about to explode. In the evening the day before Veronica told him to chillout, because he really acts like he’s about to marry Keith (which he actually did three years before, but nobody mentions it anymore).

But Lance cannot help it. He’s sitting on the carpet between Keith and Hunk, and he’s listening to Katie chatting about some topics. It’s nothing really important to him, but the girl’s voice sounds excited, so he assumes she must be enjoying it.

“Can it finally finish?” He whisper asks Hunk, looking at Keith, who’s just zoned out a little bit, slightly concerned.

“Only five more minutes,” Hunk whispers back, pointing at the clock that’s hanging on the wall. He’s incredibly smart for his age, actually, he’s the only one from his small group of friends who can read the clock. Even Katie can’t do that, but she always says it’s Matt’s fault. Her brother likes technology and absolutely craves everything that’s connected with it. His obsession lead to having only electronic clocks in their house. Katie would’ve learnt how to read these analog clocks, but where?

The school didn’t reach this part of the material yet and she couldn’t do that at home. What else should she do? Randomly knock upon Hunk’s door and explain that she came to “learn how clocks work, aunt Garrett”. Nobody would take her seriously, even if she's only five years old, so she decided not to even try.

Finally, the bell rings and kids start to get up. Even Keith manages to come back to reality from his thoughts.

“See you tomorrow!” The teacher waves at them as she starts packing up all of her stuff to her bag.

“Jesus, finally!” Lance quickly follows Hunk and Katie, not even bothered by Keith, who’s struggling with keeping his pace as fast as Lance’s. “You wanna come with us?” He asks as they all stop by the gym’s door.

“Katie wants to finish her talk,” Hunk answers quickly, pointing at his friend who’s killing the clock with her stare right now.

“Yes, I can’t leave it now!” Her voice screeches in a funny way. “Hunk, we’re going!” She grabs his shoulder and drags him back to class, hoping she’ll catch the teacher before she leaves the school’s building.

Keith’s hand stops right before his knuckles hit the door. He’s not one hundred percent sure if he wants to knock, he can as well just turn on his heel and walk back home, but Lance standing here beside him doesn’t allow him to. His smile widen as they just stay here, not knowing what they should actually do.

“Come on, just knock!” Lance pushes his friend to the side, knocking upon the door himself. Keith freezes as he’s waiting for someone to answer, but he secretly hopes they are late and nobody’s in there anymore.

Oh, he’s so wrong, unfortunately. Loud voice shouts something to them, probably “Come in!”, but in Keith’s head it could be as well “Get out!” and this option would definitely do better. Well, here comes the time when he can’t give up anymore, not after the coach literally told them to enter the room. They do, or, more like, Lance does, pushing Keith inside, so he can be seen first as he’s the one who’ll be in the team.

“Hello, boys! You must be Keith, right? Your parents called me yesterday. I’m coach Dos Santos, but you can call me Joaquim, if you’d like,” The tall man speaks up, giving Keith slightly intimidating, yet still pleasing vibes. “Get your jersey and go get changed over there,” he points at the door inside the gym and continues. “You can get your friend if you want. After you’re ready, just go to the field so we can start our practice. Is that okay?” He finally asks, grabbing his big binder from the desk.

Keith simply nods, not feeling particularly comfortable with talking to this man. He knows he will have to do it, sooner or later, but he definitely prefers later. Then, he grabs a package with the jersey and gestures to Lance to make the boy follow him to the changing room.

Once they’re here, Keith simply starts changing while Lance is jumping around and almost trips over his own shoes. Keith likes to see him this happy and excited, but right now he’s too anxious to even pay proper attention to things happening around him.

“I don’t like it, it’s too big!” He pulls the red material of his shirt, causing the bold-lettered, white ‘10’ and ‘Kogane’ to expand. Lance, whom Keith expected to say something soothing, starts laughing instead. Keith doesn’t know why, but he likes him too much to snap at him for his behavior.

“Tuck it in your pants, silly!” Lance can’t believe that his smart, lovely Keith Kogane doesn’t know it. That’s the main thing you should know while being in the team, well, at least from Lance’s point of view.

Keith does everything as he was told by his friend and then they both exit the changing room in order to walk in the field’s direction. Keith has never seen a place to play this big in his entire life, mostly because he always plays in his or Lance’s garden. Lance quickly goes to take his seat in the front row on the stands, as he doesn’t want to disturb the practice.

He carefully listens to the coach introducing Keith to the others and that’s the first time Lance wishes he could stand by his side right now. His friend is clearly uncomfortable with all the attention focused on him, but it quickly washes off as the real practice starts.

Lance watches in awe as all the boys balance their balls on their knees with barely any effort. Keith showed it to him a few times back at home and Lance couldn’t believe it was even possible. And now he gets to see over twenty boys doing the same thing and he’s convinced they’re all gods. Because how else could they do such things so easily?

Then Keith shows the other exercise, which is slaloming in between the cones, at the same time trying not to lose control on the ball. As Lance hears the coach explaining this, he thinks it’s just impossible to manage. Your brain has to be focused on so many things it just can’t work well.

Apparently, it does and Keith proves Lance wrong. He’s definitely got the potential, that’s what the coach keeps screaming at him. Keith’s no longer scared nor anxious, a tiny cute smirk now plastered to his face. Lance can’t help it but smile widely, as he’s extremely proud of his friend. This kid is talented, but that’s only the beginning.

The coach announces that they’ll be having a practice match in a few minutes, so boys can drink some water and warm up decently. Keith wants to talk to Lance for a minute, but coach told him not to, as it may distract him and he won’t be able to show his real skills during the game. He follows some older, ten-year-old players, who immediately chose him to be in their team. They must’ve seen the potential Keith has, Lance thinks. Coach suddenly whistles, announcing that the game is starting now.

It’s wild, Lance has to admit. Everyone’s screaming and running this fast that even coach Dos Santos can’t manage to follow them properly. Keith’s body flows perfectly fine, he looks like he was born on the pitch. That’s what Lance’s known for some time already, but seeing his friend play the actual game makes Lance admire him even more than he did before. He’s thoughts are focused only on Keith, this much he doesn’t even realize that Katie and Hunk have been sitting besides him for a few minutes now. They stayed silent then, not wanting to disturb Lance, but now the girl just can’t help it, so she pokes the Cuban kid’s shoulder.

“You really love Keith, don’t you?” She teases, a cute little giggle escaping her lips. Her and Hunk joke around about it much, they’re both very observant as for such a young age.

“Yeah, of course I do,” Lance is caught off guard, still daydreaming. “Is there something wrong with it?” He sounds genuinely concerned about this, as he sees Katie’s serious expression. She usually doesn’t look like that, so Lance’s brain starts to be really worried.

“No! I think you look cute toge—” her words are suddenly cut by Lance’s scream.

“Yeah, go Keith!”, He cheers, throwing his left fist in the air. Then reality hits him and he realizes he brutally interrupted his friend’s talk. “Sorry, go on, Katie.”

“I said that you and Keith look cute together,” She repeats, pressing more accent on the word ‘cute’.

“My older brother has a boyfriend!” Hunk chimes in, realizing that these words may make Lance feel better. “They’re so nice and they remind me of you and Keith.”

“Oh, that’s cool! Thanks, buddy!” Lance gives him some thumbs up, then goes back to watching the game.

Lance wishes they could stop talking so he can finally focus, but he’s too polite to refuse chatting with his friends. They could’ve gone home, but no, they still managed to show up here, so that’s why he needs to appreciate them now.

On the other hand, Katie and Hunk really wish Lance would just shut up for a second, because, even though he wants to focus, he keeps shouting random cheers at Keith and it slowly begins to be annoying. Actually, now his mouth is shut and his eyes are simply following the ball, or, rather, Keith, who still manages to keep the ball near his legs. Lance wonders how he does that when half of the players are at least two years older than him.

And then, all of a sudden, Lance stands up, just as if his butt was electrocuted.

“Oh my God, Hunk, Katie, he scored!” Lance yells, smiling widely. “I can’t believe that! Keith, I love you!” He then exclaims, putting his both hands in a shape of a heart, making sure that Keith heard him.

Hunk and Katie chuckle slightly, as they watch this whole scenery. They can’t believe this boy actually manage to shout ‘I love you!’ so loudly, that probably the whole city could hear him.

Lance, who probably should be embarrassed or ashamed, is actually none of these. He’s still only a kid, who’s got an unintentional crush on his best friend and doesn’t see anything wrong with this. He’s just happy to have Keith by his side, doesn’t care about other people’s opinion. They’re very young, so nobody really pays attention to other’s behavior and if they do, Lance won’t even notice, as he’ll be too busy living his best life with Keith.

☆° ◆ ～ ◆ °☆

Eight years old Keith wishes his mind was as sharp as Lance’s, when it comes to sitting still during lessons. They both aren’t the best students, but at least Lance is able to focus, even a little bit. He’s exhaling shakily while he’s trying to listen to the teacher, explaining some sort of maths problem that he really doesn’t care about at all.

Maths is their last period on Monday and right now Keith would like it to be dismissed more than ever. It’s not like he doesn’t like it, it’s good for his brain and he can’t say that he doesn’t enjoy it when he solves the problem right. His mind is focused on something more now, and his notebook is still empty, even though Lance is currently writing the solution for the fourth problem.

“Keith, would you mind paying some attention?” The teacher calls him like… fifth time during this lesson.

Lance giggles quietly as he watches Keith’s eyes grow wider in awe. He usually doesn’t care, but being called multiple times never leads to anything particularly good. Keith’s tense muscles relax as he hears Lance’s soft laugh. Dear God, this boy never fails in cheering him up.

“Maybe you’d like to come to the board and solve the following problem for us?” The teacher speaks up again, looking Keith dead in the eyes.

He freezes, fists clenched under the table. It’s not his fault he’s just excited for the upcoming game. It’s gonna lead his team up and make them even more known than they already are, and he just wants to focus only on this right now.

“Calm down, Keithy boy,” Lance whispers into the other boy’s ear, making sure the teacher won’t hear him. Getting in trouble now, before the match he’s gonna watch is the last thing he wants.

“I know the answer!” Katie’s hand is suddenly thrown in the air, as she seems overly excited about her statement.

“Great, come here,” the teacher gestures to the board, so Katie stands up and starts solving the simple equation written on it. She looks behind her back for a second, meeting Keith mouthing ‘thank you’ to her. She’s saved his day, as he knows he’d be screwed for sure if she didn’t chime in.

Keith watches as Lance writes the same answer Katie’s scribbling on the board and he can’t get over the fact that his friend’s handwriting is extremely pleasing to look at. It’s impossible how pretty and readable it actually is. Keith tries to imitate it, but it goes nothing as planned. He just sucks ass, so he decides to stick to his own, ugly and scribbly one.

Lance focuses on the board, trying to read some of the numbers that Katie wrote a little too small. His freckled nose wrinkles slightly, just as he snores quietly when Katie messes up four so it looks like nine. Keith absolutely adores this boy, and that’s easily said. He’s bad at feelings, so he never says he loves him, but also never denies when Lance tells him such things.

Then the teacher sends Katie back to her desk and sits by her own one, reading something in her binder. Lance clearly sees what’s coming, Keith doesn’t, which causes another quiet outburst of Cuban’s laughter. Keith is literally impossible when he’s this excited, actually Lance would like to see him like that more often, but we can’t always have what we want.

“Okay, guys,” The teacher places both her hands on the dark, wooden desk. “It’s time to check our homework, I hope every one of you did it.”

“Oh my God,” Lance mutters under his breath, now seeing what’s coming even more than he did before. Keith’s eyes suddenly fill with anger as he realizes it’s not his best day today.

“Keith, would you like to share your answers with us?” She asks, voice sweet, but one chord shows how close she is to completely losing it. She’s usually one of the kindest teacher at school and her students absolutely love her, but now Keith’s not thinking straight.

“I don’t have them,” he answers simply, feeling Lance’s fingers around his own wrist. Oh, there he is, trying to comfort his friend from a complete outburst.

“Excuse me, you what, Keith?”

“I don’t have my homework,” he repeats, looking at his teacher’s face serious as never before. “I had many more important things to do,” he states.

While Missus’ lip skips a few breaths, Lance’s fingers tighten and intertwine with Keith’s. Maybe it was too much, but Keith never sees if he’d crossed any boundaries or not, that’s his main flaw, but he never really cares about it, not even now.

Keith is lucky that he didn’t have any problems in maths before, because if he did, he would be already on his way to the principal’s office, again. He has, well, some behavior issues and it’s hard to keep them stable. Both his parents and Lance are trying to do something about it, but now they all are failing miserably.

“Keith, please,” Lance whispers again, holding the boy’s hand tightly. “Don’t get in trouble again, do it for me.”

Well, they may be only in primary school, but the rules still apply here, especially when you’re a part of the soccer team. Coach Dos Santos can’t stand any type of misbehavior and actually, Keith’s skills are the only thing that prevents him from dropping out. Lance has to be Keith’s stability and help him stay out of stuff like messing with teachers, because he wants to see Keith in the team till they finish this school.

Finally, the blessing in a form of bell’s ringing arrives to save Keith from further suffering. He storms out of the classroom, Lance struggling to reach him. Guess two years of playing in the team did its job, now Keith is unable to be outrun by anyone, only one or two eleven year old teammates.

“Keith, can you please—” Lance stops to take another deep breath. “Stop running for a while, I can’t— I can’t catch up with you!” He shouts out the last part, when Keith finally stops by the exit door.

“Jeez, your physical condition is a mess, Lancey. Maybe I should exercise with you sometimes?” He smiles, now noticing that Lance’s whole body begins to shake.

Keith freaks out, and it literally means freaks out. Lance is always acting overdramatic, but this time it’s even more. Keith is never good with comforting people, but he tries hard, even though with Lance it’s something different. He’s not like any other person Keith knows and he still can’t figure out if it’s a good thing, or rather not.

“Are… you okay?” He asks, not sure what should we do to make Lance feel better.

“I’m excited, how come you’re not?” Lance jumps in front of Keith, suddenly smiling and acting overly delighted. Keith chuckles under his breath, still looking a little worried at his friend. Lance, even though he’s emotional, never acts like this.

“I am! But Lance, I have to—” he stops, when Lance’s body starts shaking even more than before. Oh God, this boy will be literally the death of him. Keith breathes heavily, trying not to lose it. “Lance, I have to hit the practice now. You should come home, get ready and, please, chill out a bit.” He laughs on full volume now, reaching for Lance’s hand and squeezing it, or more like, attempting to, as Cuban boy’s hand is too shaky to hold it decently. “Lance, you’re shaking! I swear to God, I am the one who’s supposed to be nervous here!” He yells in between a few sudden laughs.

He can’t help but think that Lance is impossibly adorable when he’s excited. He’s always been, but now, when he’s a little older, it really shows and Keith finally notices that. Maybe he is in love, maybe not? He likes Lance and he doesn’t need to label his feelings under any names. They’re not adults, they live their lives as if tomorrow was their last day. Keith wishes he was a little bit older, maybe similar to Veronica’s age, he thinks his life with Lance would be even better then, but it’s impossible and he has to stick to what he’s got now.

Suddenly, Keith literally jumps at Lance and embraces him tightly, hiding his nose in the boy’s chocolate curls. They usually smell citrus-like, because he tends to steal Rachel’s conditioner. He doesn’t really care about his own hair’s condition, as he’s too young for this, but his sister’s cosmetics smell so nicely he can’t just leave them without trying.

Now he clearly bought a new shampoo, Keith is sure about that. This one smells differently, similar to the ocean and coconut, it reminds him of spending the weekends on the beach, as they used to do during their summer break. Keith sniffs this amazing smell for a solid minute or more. He feels Lance’s warm little hands on the back of his neck and smiles, soft blush forming on his face. Lance always does that, his hands are always above Keith’s, making the other boy feel cared and loved. Lance is taller and when they hug, Keith always, always, feels so innocent and small, but doesn’t mind it at all. His family is not one of these cuddly ones and Keith secretly loves being taken care of, so having a friend like Lance is a true blessing.

“You like my shampoo?” Lance asks, giggling. Keith groans in Lance’s ear, or, in his hair, as he still doesn’t feel like rising his head. Cuban boy decides to continue, as his friend doesn’t seem very talkative now. “Veronica picked it, when we went to the store with mamá. She got this one, because, as she told me, it reminds her of her childhood back in Cuba. You know, I was never here for long, so I don’t know how it is, but Vee, Luis and Marco tell me it was awesome! You know, as they say, it was a lot like here, in Florida, but still. They speak Spanish, for example! People here don’t, at least not everyone, which kinda sucks, because I like it!”

“Lance, you’re rambling, and as much as I want to listen to you, I can’t,” Keith stops him, finally pulling away from the embrace. “I’m probably late for practice, coach won’t let it go!”

“Wait,” Lance whispers, poking Keith’s shoulder. “Win this game for me, Keithy,” Lance doesn’t even ask if he will, as he is one hundred percent sure he will. Keith is always the best, so Lance doesn’t have to worry about the team’s victory.

Keith only smiles, not bothering to say a word. He searches for something in his bag, as if his life was depending on this. Lance stares at him all the time, but Keith looks like he’s so lost and the Cuban kid even considers walking home, but then Keith grabs some kind of material and slowly pulls it from his bag. Actually, the best way to describe it is tries to pull it out. It’s stuck in between his books and team jersey. Finally, after a few minutes of struggling followed by Lance’s cute laugh, he manages to pull out his team jacket.

It’s red with white sleeves, looking a lot like high schools’ baseball merch. It’s got white, bold-lettered ‘Kogane’ written all across the back and on the left side on the front. The right side is decorated with white and crimson red lightnings, the team’s symbol. They’re just in primary, they shouldn’t take it all this seriously, but they can’t help it but admire high school league to the point they’d convinced coach Dos Santos to get them the actual team jackets.

Keith hands it to Lance, who grabs it with no hesitation. He loves it when Keith gives you his clothes, they always smell so nice, it’s impossible. Lance puts the jacket on himself just as if it was the most important part of his merch. Actually, that’s true. Nothing is better than cheering for your friend in his own team’s clothes.

“No doubt I will win this match,” Keith smiles.

He’s proud of himself, as he was practicing hard the whole previous month. The whole team did and Keith is happy and confident to be their captain. Now he can't doubt them and he hopes he will do everything to lead them to the victory.

“Okay, now go home, Lance,” Keith pats his shoulder and immediately heads back to the last practice before The Game.

Lance almost sprints to his house and it takes him surprisingly little time, around five minutes, when normally it takes him more than ten. He realizes that he can run really fast without feeling even a bit tired, as adrenaline flows in his veins and the excitement takes control over his brain.

As soon as he comes back he slams the door open and goes absolutely insane.

“Mamá, I need to get my merch, now!” He screams, not even bothering to say ‘buenas tardes’, as he always does. “I need my cap, my flags and facepaint! Rachel, where did you put my facepaint!?” He starts to compulsively run around the house trying to collect every item he needs, as he only has one hour remaining before the play starts.

“Do you have Keith’s jacket?” Veronica laughs loudly, shifting on the sofa and staring right at her younger brother.

“Aw, your boyfriend’s having a game!” Luis laughs as well, after he immediately stops packing his things. He’s twenty now, finishing his sophomore year in college and almost ready to move out with his girlfriend, the same one Lance blamed for taking Blue five years later.

“Yes, I am, and yes, he’s got a game!” Lance yells the response, being already halfway up the stairs, sprinting to Rachel and his room. “Rachel!” He cries out when he enters the room, falling on the bed. “You have to paint my face, now!”

“Okay, give me a second!” Rachel doesn’t seem to be offended by Lance’s shouting, as she’s only two years older than him.

“You sure you don’t wanna come?” Lance has been asking her about going to the game for days now, but Rachel always politely declined. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to come, she just doesn’t think it’ll be a good idea.

“I’d love to, but I have some stupid homework to do,” that’s right, her teacher gave her class some project she’s been working on for about two weeks and still isn’t close to the end. “Besides, you’ll get sick of my rambling, plus, sports are not really my thing.”

Lance shrugs when Rachel starts painting the white lightning on his cheek. Paint feels soothingly cold and his sister is a master with brushes. They’re actually old Veronica’s make up ones she messed up completely, but they still worked for her younger siblings.

“Sports are nice, I mean, I have no clue how to play, but I like watching it,” Lance chuckles quietly, trying not to move his head too much.

Rachel changes her white paint to the red one, but a laughter catches her before she can even start painting Lance’s face again.

“You enjoy watching Keith, not sports in particular,” she gently boops his nose, as she knows he won’t even deny it. Everyone in the house know about his relationship with Keith and there’s no need to lie about it, because either way, nobody will believe him.

“Maybe I do,” he smiles brightly, as Rachel finally starts putting the red paint on his cheeks.

It takes her another five minutes or so to get all done, and after she hands Lance the mirror he nearly cries as she did such a great job. He asks her once or twice if she seriously doesn’t wanna come, to which she only responds by laughing, so Lance just heads towards the stairs and starts running down them.

After almost falling, like… three times, Lance is finally downstairs and grabs the team cap somebody, probably Veronica, put on the drawer. He annoys them all, that’s for sure, but still, he’s their brother, so when he’s in a desperate need for something, just like now, they’ll do anything to help him. He smiles brightly and his eyes say ‘thank you’, even though he sees Marco’s starting to laugh at his face. Well, right now, with the jacket, cap, a bunch of flags and painted face Lance looks like a walking team’s merch. He, personally, loves, but Marco seems to have some fun looking at this.

Lance yells something to his mother, then grabs their home phone and quickly taps Hunk’s home number. They could have smartphones by now, but their parents still think they’re too young, besides, Lance doesn’t feel the need of his own phone. He can use the home one whenever he needs to make a call to his friend or something.

After a few noises of a signal, Ms Garrett picks up the phone.

“Hello, Tia Garrett, may I speak with Hunk?” Lance asks, exactly the way his mother taught him to. He’s a very polite child, even though he sometimes doesn’t seem like one, especially while talking to his friends.

He’s waiting for Hunk to come get the phone, as he hears Ms Garrett yelling at her son to go and grab the phone, because, quoted ‘your bestie is calling!’. She covers the microphone so the yelling isn’t so intense, but Lance can still hear her and he smiles softly as she’s referring to him as ‘bestie’. He sure is one, but hearing someone else calls him that is a completely new experience.

“Hey, Lance!” Hunk finally manages to get to the phone. Lance is happy to hear the enjoyed tone in his friend’s voice. Finally, there’s someone who is as hyped as Lance. Katie probably is too, but Lance is not gonna phone her, because she lives door-to-door with Hunk, so she’s gonna come with him.

“Hey there, Hunky! Marco and I are going to the car soon, hopefully!” He quickly glares at his brother, who doesn’t look like someone who’s gonna drive a car in a few minutes. “He will stay with us for a game, so no need to bring your parents and worry them! Your mom will bring you and Katie and drop you to the game, right?” He stops, only to here an excited reply going like ‘Yes!’ multiple times, so he continues. “Okay, awesome, see you in a few, Hunky!”

After he hangs up, he almost throws the phone to its place with shaky hands. He looks at Marco one more time, finding his brother completely chilled on a couch, chatting about something with Veronica. Lance runs towards them and almost falls on his brother’s shoulders, shouting loudly to the point their neighbors could hear him for sure.

“Marco, we have to go now!” If only he was older and stronger, then he would definitely pull his brother above the couch’s back, as if it was the most usual thing ever. But he can’t do it, so instead, he decides to remind and beg him countless times, until the other boy gets the message and cooperates with him.

“Marco, you have to drive me! Come on! Luis, help me get him up!” He calls his oldest brother, but he’s nowhere to be seen.

Veronica is getting slightly annoyed by her younger brother, but still, the whole situation is beyond funny. Watching Marco slowly losing all his shit is overly entertaining, she knows she probably shouldn’t enjoy his suffering, but guess that’s what happens if you grow up in the Serrano household.

“Okay, fine!” Marco can’t just simply take it anymore, just as Lance planned.

They go to the car, Lance running like there’s no tomorrow, followed by Marco’s loud whining. He could be having fun by now, but no, Lance had to come up with something like this. Hunk’s mom could as well pick him up as their house is on the way to school, that’s what Marco learnt when he was forced to, no surprise, drop Lance to his friend, right after school ended.

“Can’t you drive any faster?” Lance whines, trying to focus on anything he can: radio playing some stupid music, houses they’re passing by, he even manages to check if he packed every essentials, like, at least three times. Still, he can only think about the car moving slower than a turtle, which is, indeed, really slow.

“If you want your brother in jail for breaking the speed limits and killing some random person that pops up, then yes, Lance, I can drive much more faster,” he replies sarcastically, even though mom keeps telling him he can’t do that in front of younger kids, as they may not understand the real meaning of words. But, mom is not here, and what she doesn’t see won’t hurt her.

“But— I’ll be late!” His voice cracks a little when he shouts at Marco with this high-pitched, annoying tone.

“Isn’t the match in like… forty minutes?” Marco asks, breathing heavily. Lance’s behavior stopped being funny when they were still at home, but this boy is too excited to slow down.

“Yes, it is, but I have to be there for practice!” He crosses his arms on his chest and turns his head to the window, acting truly offended. His whole family should know that he’s always on Keith’s practice and he just can’t miss it. Okay, he had to get ready, so he missed almost half of the practice, but he has to at least show up. That’s the promise made two years before and he’ll do everything to keep it.

“Why?” Marco lowers his voice a little, realizing maybe he overdid his teasing, as Lance really looks touched.

“Keith!” Lance shouts in response, now his eyes filled with love instead of anger. Marco sighs in defeat and adds some miles to his speed, knowing there’s no other more important thing than Keith. He can’t believe how Lance manages to store this amount of love in such a tiny body. Vice versa to Keith, his body is even smaller than Lance’s, so it's nearly impossible. Actually, if love was a material substance, it would be flooding away from their ears, or something. Marco shrugs as the thought passes in his brain. That’s gross, he’s thankful it doesn’t work that way.

Finally, thirty minutes before the actual game, Marco parks his car on the school’s driveway. Lance grabs the older male’s hand and guides him in Katie and Hunk’s direction. They’re staying near the bench, waving back at Ms Garrett, who just dropped them to the place. Then the friends sit on the bench, Lance in the middle, leaving Marco standing behind them. Lance pulls out the paints he packed up when Rachel was done painting him. Now he can try to do it on his friends, hoping it doesn’t turn as a complete disaster. His hand is shaky, even more than before, and he’s really thankful that the team’s symbol is one of the simplest possible.

“It’s cold!” Katie shrugs, when Lance puts a little too much paint on her face. She’s never had this much on her face and it feels like she’s got a shell here.

“Hold still!” Lance warns her, really close to smudging the paint all over her cheek. If she doesn’t stop moving, then it for sure will be a mess.

Hunk is way better, he just smiles and sits here without moving until Lance announces he’s all done. Katie grabs her bag and pulls out her own flags, handing two of them to Hunk’s hands. They both look a little more usual than Lance, who can really be considered a walking merch. If he could, he would literally write ‘Keith’ on his forehead, but it wouldn’t really make sense, because it would be too small to be noticed, so this idea became quickly abandoned.

“Come on!” Lance stands up and runs to the stands, only to make sure nobody took his front row seats. Keith promised they will be waiting for him, but Lance just wants to check it, because you can never be sure. “We made it! Hey, Keith!” Lance waves at him when they sit down. Actually, nobody else could take the seats as Lance, Katie and Hunk are the first people here.

Keith turns his head while running, almost hitting his teammate in the back.He quickly shows a thumb up to Lance, smiling brightly. He didn’t think Lance would actually make it to the practice, as sometimes it takes so much time for him to get ready, but he actually did! Lance is truly unstoppable when it comes to anything Keith-related, he was always saying that, but right now he’s just simply proving it with his behavior.

Marco’s eyes grew enormously wide as he watches this kid play. That is only a practice game, but damn! Keith is really talented, even the second oldest Serrano has to admit it.

“Woah, he really is great!” He exclaims, pointing at Keith, who just scored a goal from an ungodly angle.

Lance looks impossibly soft when he slowly turns to his brother, with a lovely look in his eyes. Lance is truly lovestruck, there’s no other possibility.

“Of course, I told you he is, Keith is awesome, I love him,” he smiles, turning back to watch the practice.

Thirty remaining minutes pass quickly, quicker than Lance would like it to. Still, it’s not the worst, as the real game will be way more entertaining. Lance is not wrong, well, he likes to joke around that he’s never wrong, which, apparently, happens to be true. Keith knows this, even though he always argues with Lance about that.

But now he’s not close to arguing. He’s standing in the middle of the field, hand in hand with the other team members, facing the stands. The school’s anthem starts playing and the team, as well as the audience, start singing. Keith’s voice disappears in dozens of others, but Lance doesn’t need to hear his voice. Keith is perfect just standing there, looking proud as ever. Lance smiles the widest he can, placing his fist on his heart. They are still young, but they feel somewhat a strong connection with their school, so they sing the anthem proudly.

Lance can’t lie, he doesn’t really pay attention to the game in particular. Of course, he watches Keith as he passes the ball, but it’s just Keith and Keith only to him. Nobody else truly matters now. Actually, once Keith even gets fouled and Lance is shouting from the stands to get this player off the field.

“Fu— Hell, get this!” Keith manages to scream, trying his best not to curse, it’s not allowed, but sometimes it’s impossible to avoid. Seconds after he passes the ball to his mate his legs are cut by the other team’s player and Keith falls on the ground. He could’ve called this guy to be removed, but there’s no time for it. All that matters is victory, no some bruise on his thigh. It will heal, their loss won’t.

Keith does the same ‘score from an ungodly angle’, as Marco labeled it, during this match, scoring the second goal in the game. Lance can’t believe it’s happening. It’s all passing so quickly he has to stay focused all the time. Once, he moved his look from the pitch to his friend for a second, and when he turned back, he couldn’t see where the ball is for almost five minutes. It got lost in the amount of players and it became really distracting.

Not that Keith isn’t distracting, because he’s a hell of a distraction. He leads the team well, making them stay on their opponents’ part of the pitch nearly the whole match. It’s two to zero now, they can relax, but no, there are still three minutes remaining and they can't waste them.

There’s this kid, Ryan Kinkade, who’s Keith’s age and is not the best player, but now, under a lot of pressure, his skills and intuition are showing. Due to his awesome pass Keith can score their last goal before the final whistle arrives. That’s it, they won the game, they’re officially the best primary school team in this district of Fort Lauderdale. That’s quite a great achievement, especially if you count in the fact that they haven’t won this competition for a couple of years.

Keith’s face is all blushy and smiley as he just stands there, showing two piece signs with his fingers. The sweat is running down his forehead and the big bruise is forming on his thigh, but he looks adorable. Lance quickly grabs the camera he got from home and snaps one picture of his lovely friend, or, should he be called his boyfriend now? After the picture is taken Keith waves at Lance and gestures him to wait a moment, as he walks back to his teammates to hug all of them and congratulate them. Lance loves watching him that way, all happy and excited, and beyond proud. That’s the best Keith ever, well, maybe besides the sleepover, bed hair, impossibly cute Keith.

Then he comes back to Lance, leaning against the railing that’s separating both of them. Lance jumps over the rail to stand right beside Keith, as the shorter boy smirks slightly.

“Told you I’ll win the game for you,” he even attempts to wink, but fails miserably, as he ends up just blinking both of his eyes.

Lance softly laughs at him, embracing him tightly and whispering something nobody could really hear. They stay like that for a few minutes before Keith pulls out and goes to quickly hug Hunk and Katie. He’s not a cuddler with anyone other than Lance, but still, they’re his friends, so they deserve something.

“You took it seriously, didn’t you?” Keith smiles and says after a few glances at his friends’ faces. It’s impossible cute of them, but still a little ridiculous.

“Of course we did!” Lance pouts. “We had to properly cheer for the best player of the match!”, He points at Keith’s t-shirt and his own (well, Keith’s) jacket, both saying ‘Kogane’, as a weird proof of him being the best player.

Marco’s on the phone with, presumably, one of his friends, Hunk and Katie are chatting about some kind of a project, so Lance decides to use this opportunity. He leans in Keith’s direction and gently presses his lips against the shorter boy’s ones. He tries to make it look like the way Luis kisses his girlfriend, but Lance’s kisses are more gentle and way softer. It’s their first actual kiss on the lips, but they enjoy it. Keith likes the way Lance’s lips touch his own and he silently promises himself he’ll never ever forget it.

“Marco, let’s go! Keith is staying the night!” Lance exclaims, then says goodbye to his friends, who slowly begin to walk to Hunk’s mom’s car.

It’s rather late for eight years old kids, as it’s almost ten in the evening when they’re finally done with explaining every detail about the match. They can finally sit in Lance’s room and chill out a bit. Keith’s in Lance’s clothes, a little too loose on him, but he doesn’t mind, they smell like Lance, so that’s awesome.

“You were amazing!” Lance says, like… tenth time this day, if not more. He just loves complimenting Keith, who gets all flustered as he doesn’t receive those often.

“Yes, you told me that already, thank you,” he lies besides Lance, fighting with himself whether he should grab the boy’s hand or not.

Lance looks pretty now, lying on his back and looking Keith in the eyes. His own ones are sparkling, full of the stars the same as the ones on his bedroom's walls and the ceiling. Keith sees all of it, all of Lance’s beauty and will undoubtedly fight anyone who calls Lance ugly. He believes there are no such people, as it’s impossible to miss Lance’s perfectness.

Suddenly, the tall boy stands up and pulls his hands in Keith’s direction. He looks at it, visibly confused, unsure about what he should do with it. Eventually, Lance grabs Keith’s palm in his own, forcing him to stand up from the bed. Then, Lance guides him to the drawer, showing some old device, radio-like, but coming from older times.

“My mamá showed me the station with Latino music once,” Lance explains, turning the device on. Sot music sounds fill the room, making Keith’s muscles immediately relaxed. “In the evening they’re always playing these cool, slow dance-ish songs. Mamá told me she used to dance to them with papá! She even showed me one dance, I know it perfectly!” He said proudly, squeezing Keith’s hand.

He’s still not fully sure, but it changes when Lance places his hand on Keith’s waist and guiding Kogane’s one on his shoulder.

“Now, we’re gonna just move in circles, it’s easy!” He encourages Keith, whose sore feet refuse to cooperate. He’s placing them on the floor gently, trying to imitate Lance’s grace. “Yeah, you got this!” Lance pulls him closer to his chest, so Keith can feel his heartbeat.

It’s all cool and sweet until the door screech as somebody walks in. Lance is too focused on Keith, but the sudden tension in his muscles make Lance notice his younger, five years old brother, Jorge.

“What are you— doing?” He says, a yawn interrupting him in the middle of a sentence. Lance figures out he probably shouldn’t have put the music so loud. Well, it wasn’t really loud, but when the house is rather silent everything can be considered that way. He probably woke his brother up and now he has to pay for it.

“We are—” Keith tries to explain, all flustered and stuttery. He knows he did nothing wrong, but still, something feels odd. Jorge is quite observant and smart, and his look can really read your mind.

Lance is caught off guard, still staring deeply in Keith’s eyes, now filled with fear. He clings to Lance’s body a little more, feeling his legs suddenly go weaker. Lance decides to save the day, as he’s not intimidated by his younger brother’s stare.

“We were dancing! That’s what older kids do when they love each other,” he explains, acting like he was much older, not only three years. “Sorry if we woke you up, we’ll be silent now, but please, don’t tell mamá I stayed up late!” Lance beggs, embracing his hands like he’s praying.

Jorge is a nice kid, so he won’t tell anybody. He just turns on his heels and comes back to his bedroom, and when he disappears, Lance can finally breathe properly. He was holding his breath a little, hoping that his brother will turn out as nice as he always is. Which, apparently, paid off, so it was not worth all the not breathing thing.

After Jorge came back to his room, Lance and Keith make their way to the bed, trying to be comfortable. Lance gives his friend another blanket. They could sleep under the same one, but Lance promised himself he won’t make this mistake ever again. Once, only once, when it happened, Lance got kicked out from bed three times, smashed with Keith’s hand five times and almost strangled twice. Keith is the very shifting type, so Lance doesn’t want to risk losing a blanket at night.

“Sorry for my brother, he’s weird when we wake him up,” Lance laughs, lying on the bed.

“Yeah, figured,” Keith giggles, starting to shift already. He’s struggling with finding the right position, but unless Lance’s asleep, he doesn’t mind at all.

They lie in silence, looking each other in the eyes. They may be young, but their love is strong and sincere. It’s not full of lies, as it sometimes happens between two adults. They don’t even argue, at least not about important things, not like Keith’s parents sometimes.

“Remember when you called me cariño, like… two years ago?” Keith smiles when the memory pops up in his brain. It’s one of the best memories he has, but he never actually talked about it with Lance.

“Of course I do!” Lance pouts. Well, it’s obvious he remembers that, he remembers everything that’s somehow connected with Keith.

“But did you mean it?”

Lance notices Keith’s tone grows concerned, he doesn’t have a clue why, as he’s never been like that before. Lance guesses it’s all because of the late hour and tiredness, but he still decides to comfort his friend (boyfriend? He’s still not sure).

“Of course I meant it! I love you, I thought you know that already!” Maybe he sounds a little too offended, but he just can’t help it. “For real, Keith, you’re amazing. Don’t you dare forget that!”

Keith’s already half asleep when Lance says that, but he still smiles as he hears all that. Sometimes he wonders what did he do to be rewarded with such a perfect human. He surely doesn’t deserve him, but well, Lance is here, so he has to live their best life every single day. Because, apparently, every day spent with Lance feels like Heaven and Keith is sure he can’t miss any of that.

☆° ◆ ～ ◆ °☆

It's may, which means one month more and they'll be graduating from primary. Lance is rather excited about this, but also extremely anxious. He knows it’s not gonna be as easy as it is now, and he’s worried he won’t manage as he’s really not the best of students. His siblings to their best to comfort him, especially Rachel, who’s been in middle school for almost two years now. She tells him it’s really not that bad, of course, there’s much more work to do, but still, it’s not tragic. This, apparently, doesn’t soothe Lance at all.

But then Keith chimes in, saying as quoted ‘fuck it’, because it’s gonna be alright. He doesn’t give a single damn about it, as long as he can still be with Lance. He’s just being his adorable, rebellious self and Rachel really doesn’t know how he manages to comfort her brother. For Lance it doesn’t really matter, he does and that’s the fact, nothing more is important.

Speaking of Keith, his life has been kind of weird at the time. He’s got a plaster right across his nose’s bridge and the second one on his cheek. The team has been through some hard times, the coach was absent for a few weeks, he still is, due to some sort of personal issues. Keith was told to take care of the team members, as he’s the oldest plus the captain. He got the title after this amazing match three years before, which caused a lot of rumors, as he was only eight years old and there was a bunch of older, more experienced players. But coming back to today, Keith has to take care of practice, which sometimes can be hard, as his teammates not always want to listen to him, and nothing really works.

English lesson they’re attending right now is really exhausting and impossibly boring. The teacher told them to write a short essay, that’s gonna be a practice one before the longer ones they’re gonna write in middle school. They have to write a statement on some issue, but Lance is struggling to do it. It’s actually possible to finish it at home, but he doesn’t want to waste any of his free time. He manages to write two or three sentences of the introduction, but when it comes to the most important part, his head seems to be completely empty, without no particular ideas. He exhales quicker and quicker, seeing he’s slowly running out of time.

Keith glances at him once and he can clearly see something is off. Keith himself has already scribbled half of his essay, unbothered if it’s even grammatically or whatever-else correct. He slightly pushes his own paper towards Lance, pointing at the first sentence of the middle part.

“Start like that,” he whispers when the teacher is facing the board, writing something, probably their homework, but does Keith care? Well, not really. “Then just describe it, remember that article we read with Veronica?”

That’s right, Lance thinks. They read about this topic when Veronica had to do a project about it. Suddenly, many ideas pop up in his head, just as if it was activated or unblocked after a long coma. Lance is impossibly grateful for Keith being here with him, because if he wasn’t there, Lance would be seriously, undoubtedly wrecked.

“Look, change these words,” Keith points at Lance’s work again. Then he scribbles something on the margins of his page. “Something like that would work better, I’m not sure, we should ask Katie if it’s correct,” yeah, Keith’s rather bad at spelling, due to his problems with concentrating.

When Lance starts writing on full speed, Keith watches how smoothly his left hand works. His handwriting is truly pretty, almost as if he was calligraphing every letter. Maybe he does, but even if, he’s doing it really fast, still making it look awesome and pleasing. Keith’s handwriting is awful, full of scratches and weird hieroglyphes even Keith himself can’t read, at least sometimes. He tries hard to make it readable, so the teachers don’t have to focus too much on his work, because it would be probably really tiring and annoying.

Keith suddenly feels the need to hug Lance, with no particular reason. The teacher’s leaving the room, telling the students to remain still and not try to sneak out, because she won’t be far away from the classroom, so she’ll see anyone may want to escape. Keith would literally just hug Lance right now, as the teacher is absent, but he’s too scared. He doesn’t want to cause anymore rumors, not after getting into a few fights and in the principal’s office after them. He’s considered a troublesome kid and doesn’t want anyone to talk about him anymore.

Lance doesn’t have these kind of problems, at least not that much. He stretches his hand towards Keith’s one and brushes his thumb over Keith’s knuckles. It’s really gentle and subtle, as they grew up a little bit and became more aware of their actions. They know that not everyone will be pleased with what they do in public and they should minimize the PDA as much as they can. Sometimes, they still don’t care, but mostly they just try to fit in.

Lance is pretty sure nobody’s watching them, because everyone’s busy with their own essays. Besides, the lesson is still on, so they shouldn’t really pay attention to them. He doesn’t even realize how wrong he is. Keith, on the other hand, does. His shoulders tense a little bit and grins, that’s when Lance knows it’s not gonna be as easy as he thought at the beginning. James Griffin pokes Keith’s shoulder with his pen, causing a little discomfort and leaving a painful spot when he finally stops. Keith tries really hard not to lose it, bu he just has to turn around and face James. His playful smirk is looking sickeningly sweet, Keith hates this.

“What the fuck is your problem, Griffin?” Keith snaps at him, not even caring about proper language as the teacher is not around. James is also his teammate, but an impossibly annoying on, Keith can barely hand him.

“Oh! Seems like out little Keithy boy is surely gay!” He’s just simply making fun of Keith. He wouldn’t be bothered by being called ‘gay’, but James makes it sound like the worst insult in the entire world.

Lance, being Keith’s stability as he is, forces his friend not to fight James right now. He can’t actually prevent him from doing it after school, but English lesson is definitely not the best time for arguing. Well, it never is, that’s what both Hunk and Lance always say, but Keith never listens, especially when it has something to do with Griffin. He appears as a really nice kid, and is one, apparently, just not towards Lance and Keith. However, it’s not him to blame, but his parents, who raised him this way. James is only eleven, so he just listens to what his parents say and doesn’t overthink it even the slightest. Still, Keith doesn’t care about it, Griffin is simply an asshole to him, his parents don’t matter.

After the lesson ends, James storms out of the classroom, as if he’s scared he may be caught making fun of his classmates. He may be confident towards people his age, but he loses all of it when it comes to adults, which Keith considers extremely funny, but never told anyone, except Lance.

Keith and Lance start walking to the stairs, where they always meet up with Hunk and Katie, whenever the two have different classes, just like this time. Lance has this habit of grabbing Keith’s hand and holding it every time they walk somewhere, so he does that now. His lanky fingers meet with Keith little ones, but then something happens. There’s no soothing feeling this time, it’s replaced by the awkward tension that’s never been there before. Lance watches Keith placing both of his hands behind his back, then shoving them into his hoodie’s pockets. Lance’s face shifts from his usual, lovely smile to a sad grimace, almost like he’s ready to cry. He knows he won’t do it now, but still, the fact that Keith puts Griffin’s words above Lance hurts him.

“Hey, do you really care about that Griffin kid?” Lance asks when they’re standing near the stairs, waiting for their friends to appear. He places one hand on the top of Keith’s shoulder, then continues. “I’m more important than him, aren’t I? He seems to have some sorta problem, which is stupid, by the way, and he can so screw himself, because I don’t care at all,” he states, exhaling slowly. He’s trying not to get mad at Keith, as it’s not fully his fault. He’s just afraid to be judged, which doesn’t make sense, but still.

Keith leans against the wall, not feeling like giving Lance any kind of real response. He’s deeply lost in his thoughts, trying to think through every pros and cons of fighting James. It has more cons, to be honest, so Keith decides it’s better if he leaves it as it is. Insults in particular aren’t that bad, especially when you know your own value, Keith ignores them once again. If Lance isn’t involved, he’s not gonna risk his – doubtful – reputation for someone as stupid as James.

“Did something happen to Keith?” Hunk whispers, pointing at the boy. He looks worried as ever, trying to think of many possibilities of things that could occur. His eyes are filled with worry and a lot of empathy.

“That asshole, Griffin from our English has a fucking problem with Lance and I!” Keith suddenly bursts out. “I don’t get why, because I don’t do anything wrong! He’s just messing with me all the time and I can’t stand him, Hunk, you have no idea of how annoying he is! All I do is let Lance touch my hand! For real, is it so sinned that his stupid ass can’t even stand that!? That’s not even forbidden, dammit!” He knows he shouldn’t be yelling, but there’s no other way to get it off his chest.

“Woah, man, slow down a little,” Katie interrupts, when she sees Keith’s opening his mouth again. “Holding hands may not be forbidden, but I bet shouting in the middle of the corridor is.”

“Keith, Katie’s right,” Hunk adds, using his adorable tone, trying to ease the emotions. “I have no idea why James is talking to you that way, but I have an idea… You should calm down a little and maybe even talk to James about it, discuss these thing with him. Maybe there’s some misunderstanding here, you would understand each other if you tried talking,” Hunk is literally a master in giving advice, they’re always rational and change things for the better.

Lance, however, doubts this particular one. He grabs Hunk’s shirt and drags him a few feet away, to their ‘talking spot’, a place where nobody never goes, so it’s safe to talk about important things.

“Do you really think that Keith will talk? Keith, of all people? You know him, he’s hot-headed as hell, I’m sorry, but I doubt your words will make him change. But, Hunk, I’m worried… what if Griffin is right and something’s wrong with me? With us? With it?” He’s becoming really stressed and anxious. He can’t escape the thoughts like that, especially when he tends to overthink some stuff. “You know, I told Keith that I don’t care, but the truth is that i kinda sorta do? Hunk, I don’t know what to do!”

“Lance, no,” Hunk immediately stops his friend from rambling and pushing himself down. He may be a kid, but that kind of caring, nice and extremely wise one. “Nothing’s wrong with you two, you’re just being yourselves.”

“I just love him, guess it’s really nothing wrong,” Lance shrugs it off, really trying not to think too much.

They come back to their friends, but unable to say anything, as they catch Keith and Katie in the middle of the conversation about the latest baseball match. It’s a well-known fact that both of them enjoy sports, so that’s always the main topic of their conversations. Katie is really passionate about it, also sad that this school doesn’t have any female teams, except for swimming, but that’s not her thing at all. She hopes that in her middle school there will be some teams, baseball preferably, but any kind of team sport (except this stupid swimming) will do.

When Katie jumps around, trying to imitate baseball players’ moves she saw during the match, Keith laughs, and that’s when Lance stops with doubting his feelings. He has to admit it to himself, Keith’s an extremely pretty boy with this lovely smile and fluffy dark hair of his. Lance just can’t resist any of these and, well, he doesn’t even want to.

“Um, Keith, do you…?” Lance asks, still a little unsure.

Keith just gives him one, familiar smile and tightly squeezes his hand. Things are okay again and Lance is sure about that. James Griffin can go screw himself, because they’ve got better thing to care about than this one stupid kid.

“Guys, listen!” Keith starts talking about his last practice, as he knows his friends enjoy watching him all excited and happy, so he’s just rambling, squeezing Lance’s hand whenever the emotions take control. “Last practice that Kinkade kid, you know him, struggled to keep the ball by his feet, I have no idea, how that happened, as you remember this match three years ago. The guy was awesome! Okay, nevermind, honestly, his struggling was kinda funny. But, look! I helped him a little and he did it right after! But, fuck, most of the team couldn’t even cooperate with me, I guess they don’t take me seriously enough, Jesus, I wonder when the coach will be back? You know, I had to yell at these guys non-stop and now my throat hurts! Okay, God, back to the practice— we even played that quick game and you know, Kinkade rocked it! I’m not even joking, he was amazing! Lance, no—,” Keith chuckles, as he sees Lance opening his mouth to say something. “I know you know all of that, you’re at my every practice! But these guys here don’t, so let me talk! Yeah, and during this game I scored three, which fest absolutely awesome! I swear, you guys have no idea!” He laughs again, squeezing Lance’s hand tighter. “Lance, stop! I swear to God, I know you saw me then! Everyone knows that!”

Lance wishes it could stay that way for the rest of their lives, but if it was simple it would be also boring, so yeah. It wasn’t like that at all, unfortunately.

☆° ◆ ～ ◆ °☆

  
Practice starts as always, with everyone whining about coach Dos Santos still being absent. It would be a lot easier if he was around, they could be actually training. It’s hard to manage now, as kids act like they can do anything, not giving a single shit about their captain, who literally tries his best to handle his teammates. Lance is trying to be his emotional support from the stands, but he’s not really allowed to do much. All he can is yell, but he doesn’t want to do that, as he’s older now and considers it extremely embarrassing.

Eventually, James Griffin chimes in, late as he always is. The first thing he notices is, of course, Lance, because there has to be an opportunity to make fun of Keith again.

“Hey, isn’t that your little gay boy, Keithy?” He teases, voice filled with venomous tone. “Come on, don’t be scared, I’m sure everyone will love to meet your boyfriend!”

Keith breathes heavily a few times, he’s really trying not to lose it, he promised Lance he won’t get in trouble again, not because of this guy. Instead of snapping at him, Keith just tells him to shut up, then he orders the team to stand in line and start running. It can be taken as a competition, who runs to the next line first, but it doesn’t have to. At least Keith doesn’t take it like that.

As they all run, Keith, by accident, overhears the kinda famous Ryan Kinkade talking to Griffin. Keith’s running right after them, maybe a foot apart, but they don’t even realize he’s there and he doesn’t feel like saying anything. He decides to focus on Lance, who’s still smiling at him and being his pretty self. His abilities to brighten Keith’s day are surely amazing, because he can make him smile even after every James Griffin incident.

“You should just let him go, James. He’s your captain after all, besides, he did nothing wrong to you, did he?” He whisper yells to him, trying not to disturb practice too much.

“Of course he did! I cannot stand a faggot in our team! Ryan, don’t you see that, it’s definitely not normal! Look at this guy on the stands, this is so screwed,” He snaps angrily, making the whole team hear this. Well, that’s what James wants, maybe somebody will be wise (or stupid) enough to agree with him.

That’s the time when Keith loses it. Just. Simple as it is. Nobody will insult Lance, he can stand every word towards himself, but not his lovely friend.

“Go practice passes!” He gestures to the other side of the field, grabbing James by his shoulder tightly, dragging him to the side, so they can ‘talk’, if it’s even considered talking.

“I forgave you before, Griffin, but you’ll just never tell me Lance isn’t normal, because you know no shit about him!” He spits out, trying his best not to shout too loud, as his sore throat wouldn’t take it too well. “Come on, say that again, but right into my face, if you’re brave enough, go!” He doesn't think James would do that, this kid is everything but brave, but well, people change.

“You’re screwed up, Kogane, both you and your boy,” he smiles wickedly, of course he dared to. Keith wishes he knows what exactly is James’ deal with it. He can achieve nothing, maybe rise up his ego a little, but nothing more than that.

Keith doesn't hesitate. Not anymore. His fist meets James’ cheek, he doesn’t want to hurt him, just warn him before he does it again. They mostly just try kicking each other and missing, which is kinda ironic, as they’re both in the soccer team. Lance watches the scene in awe, but he’s just frozen in place and can’t make a single move. James manages to throw his fist in Keith’s nose, causing it to bleed, just seconds before Ryan gets James and they both walk away, probably to one of their homes.

“Practice ended!” Keith shouts, standing up and wiping the sweat and blood off his face. “No worries, I’ll be okay,” he quickly soothes his teammates, mostly younger ones, who start walking towards him. He didn’t want to make a show, but it just happened. James pushed his teasing way too far and had to pay for it, but as Keith thinks about it now, he really could’ve used Hunk’s advice and try to talk to him, instead of this.

He slowly walks to the stands, as he realizes James must’ve kicked him in his calf, as it’s a little painful while walking. Lance doesn’t look upset nor disappointed, just… sad.

“I told you to quit fights, right? C’mere,” Lance pulls out a single tissue and starts cleaning up Keith’s face, while the other boy is sitting there, pouting. “What will we say to your parents, huh?”

“Lance, I don’t care, okay? I won’t let anyone talk shit about you, especially this bastard! I may get kicked out, but I just won’t let this Griffin kid talk about you like that!” He’s overprotective and Lance really admires this, just if he could protect him some other way, bit by fighting.

“Thank you, Keith, but please, be more careful next time,” Keith can be really reckless when he’s mad, so Lance has to remind him to take good care of himself, because his health is just as important as Lance’s reputation, if not more.

Keith sometimes wishes that Griffin could move our far away from here and stop bothering Lance and him, because sometimes it just gets annoying. Keith can handle a lot, but this kid is pissing him off and there’s nothing he can actually do about this.

“You wanna come over?” Lance asks, when he’s fully done with cleaning Keith. “My mamá can help me patch you up nicer, okay? I don’t have any plasters with myself now, but I’m sure there are some in my house,” Lance just wants to have him over and the truth is, he would anyways, even if Keith didn’t need any kind of patching up.

“I’d love to, but we have to make a deal,” he smiles with one corner of his lips, which looks a little weird, but for Lance is beautiful. “You can’t tell Hunk I had a fight, his heart may not survive that!” He laughs when they start walking to Lance’s home.

They only have to think about a way to sneak in front of Keith’s house unnoticed, because Keith really doesn’t need another Nick’s lecture. He’s heard enough of them already, so no need to have another one.

“Hey, I have an idea!” Keith says in between a few small chuckles. “Obviously, we can’t take your mom that I got into a fight, it won’t be responsible.”

And before he manages to say anything more, Lance interrupts him, using his a little sarcastic tone.

“Neither was actually getting into this fight, but yet here we are,” he can’t help himself but laugh when Keith’s smile is replaced by a silly, baby pout.

“Nevermind, by the way, I was defending you!” He acts touched, but moves on and states his idea. “Listen to this, it’s amazing! We can come to your house and your mom is gonna be like ‘Oh Dios Mio, what happened!?’ and then I’ll go like ‘Oh, I ran at the door, auntie, yeah, the door knob hit me a little bit’. It’s awesome, isn’t it?” The idea is surprisingly stupid, so they just go and laugh at it, though it still is something Keith would do, well, maybe without the living door knob hitting random children.

In five minutes they’re already by Lance’s house, greeted by Emanuela’s shocked gasp. She’s acting like that whenever Keith needs patching up, but after all she’s a nice woman who doesn’t actually ask many questions. She was told not to overwhelm her guests, so she never did, and it’s a fact that she actually grew up having visitors all the time. Once, they even rented the room in their house and Emanuela wanted to know everything about American citizens they were hosting, but her mother was not fond of it.It may be considered rude to casually come to people and ask them, especially if they’re at your house. So still, as an adult, she stays away from questions, even if she really wants to ask them.

“What happened to you, sweetie?” This is the safest question, as it can be asked, because, well, Keith indeed looks like something happened to him, more precisely, his face.

Lance jumps, chiming in.

“The ball hit him in the face during practice. Nothing really serious, but the nurse was absent, so I suggested coming here to patch Keith up. Is that okay, mamá?” Lance quickly explains the issue, seeing Keith silently thanking him. Not exactly mouthing, but he was still barely making any noise, but not whispering.

“Okay, I’m glad you brought him, mijo. Now let’s get you all done, Keith,” she guides both boys to the bathroom downstairs, that’s where they keep all the medical supplies.

They place Keith on the closed toilet and start moving around him really quickly. Keith can’t help but think Lance and his mother are extremely alike and they even walk the same way, the same ocean blue eyes glancing at him with worry. Emanuela grabs the box with essentials, mainly used on knee scratches and something similar, but might as well work for Keith’s nose. She pulls out a makeup removing pad and soaks it in rubbing alcohol, which smell causes Keith to shrug a little. He hates this smell, reminding him of the old, witchy nurse’s office at school. He pulls his head slightly backwards when Emanuela rises it up to his face.

“You need to cooperate with me, Keith. It’s not gonna hurt,” Emanuela tries her best to soothe him, but he's not the type to believe the ‘mom voice’ thing.

‘Not gonna hurt’, my ass, Keith thinks. Maybe he could’ve just washed it with water instead of coming here. It’s all Lance’s fault, Lance’s and his pretty, deep, blue eyes that don’t take ‘no’ as an answer. Keith’s fallen much more deep than he’d ever thought he would and now there’s no way to escape. But, to be honest, he doesn’t really wanna run away from all that, Lance is his first love and he’s gonna stick to his side as long as he can.

“I will start at three, okay?” Keith simply nods, realizing that there’s no way he’s gonna avoid the alcohol under his nose. “One, two…”

Before she reaches three, Lance pulls out the pad from her hands and quickly rubs Keith’s face. It’s happening in seconds, so he doesn’t even have time to react properly. Lance is crazy, well, can be sometimes, but this? This is beyond everything! Keith would never suspect him to do such thing.

“What the h—,” he quickly changes his words when he realizes swearing is not allowed in this household. “Heck was that, Lance!? It was supposed to be three!”

“It’s better as a surprise, Keithy,” Lance laughs, looking at Keith’s shocked expression. “You won’t move your head when you don’t see it coming, it’s a well-known fact, you should be aware!” Lance, as much as he wants to keep a straight face, he simply can’t, his lips forcing him to keep a smile on.

“Guess you didn’t need your mom’s help with patching me up anyways, huh?”

Emanuela listens to them, impressed by the fact that they can make a small talk sound so smooth and loose, completely unforced. They’re both just natural, maybe because they’re kids, she’s not sure, but it’s truly amazing.

They walk to the living room, Keith with a tissue under his nose. Lance, somehow, managed to convince him to still have one, in case the bleeding starts again. It’s better safe than sorry, besides, Lance doesn’t want to have the couch ‘decorated’ by blood stains. It’s got some already, well, not blood, but wine (Emanuela spilled it once, while hanging out with Anne), grass (it was Lance’s fault, but we don’t talk about it) and paint, because younger Rachel never realized that couch is not the best place for any art stuff.

“Mamá, do we have any lactose free ice-cream left?” Lance yells to his mother, who’s currently packing up the stuff they pulled out in the bathroom.

“Yes, in the freezer, you can go and grab some!” She answers quickly, voice muffled by the closed door.

Keith looks at Lance, confusion in his eyes.

“Why do I need ice-cream now?” He truly has no idea about all the habits in Serrano household. This family is really odd, but the positive kind of odd, Keith likes it. And the fact that they have a separate box of ice-cream without lactose for Keith specifically makes his heart melt every time. Well, actually, half of their kitchen is filled with stuff for Keith, as Lance cares deeply about keeping his friend’s diet completely lactose free.

“Ice-cream helps heal wounds faster, don’t you know? Everyone in this family knows it!” Lance throws his hands in the air. “You’re here all the time, you should be named Keith Serrano by now!” He’s got the point, Lance’s house is more of Keith’s house than his own, ironically, as they live door-to-door.

“Okay, okay, I get that,” he giggles, secretly liking the whole idea of being called ‘Keith Serrano’, it sounds nice and he wonders if it’s because of the last name itself, or maybe the fact that it’s Lance’s.

Probably the second option, though.

“By the way, Lance?” He asks in between of mouthfuls of ice-cream. “You wanna get married? Like, ever?”

“With you or just generally?” Lance is a fan of proper speaking, writing and spelling, and this question that Keith just asked has way too many meanings for his liking. Still, he decides it will be fun to tease Keith about his lack of speaking skills.

“However you like it,” Keith catches what Lance’s plans are and he can’t just leave it as it is.

“Well, I mean. Let’s take it seriously,” as serious as two eleven year old kids can be, while talking about marriage, of course. “My parents are married, and they’re happy, Luis is as well, newly-wed, actually, or however you call it. Marco’s planning on proposing to his girlfriend, but that’s a secret, you can’t tell anyone. So yeah, I’d like that, it seems fine. Also, you’re pretty cool and you defend me, I think you’d make a great husband,” Lance exhales, realizing he said everything on only one breath, but it’s alright. He thinks he didn’t get everything as right as he wanted to, but it’s over now and he hopes Keith’s satisfied with his answer.

“Yup, same to you. Besides, marriage sounds fun, you can throw glass and nobody’s looking weirdly at you!” Keith exclaims, raising up his spoon. This boy is just impossible.

“Oh, wait,” Lance suddenly realizes something. “We’re married.”

“What?”

“What you heard, we got married in preschool, remember? Katie asked our day care teacher to have a wedding, and we had!” Lance claps his hands in an oddly happy manner.

“It was stupid, we weren’t even engaged.”

☆° ◆ ～ ◆ °☆

They graduated from primary a few weeks ago, it’s early July now and Lance is ready to live his best life now. He’s counting days to his birthday, only because his mother promised him they’ll be having the party at the pools, which has been actually his dream since he learnt there are pools in this city. He feels like his life cannot be better, but then he recalls that he scheduled a small play with his friends.

He wakes up before seven in the morning, which is nearly impossible, looking at the fact that holidays started. He could sleep as much as he wants to, but no, not now, not when he made plans and has to go now. Besides, Lance can’t believe he will be twelve soon, in like, three weeks, which actually makes him the oldest of the group. Hunk’s birthday is in the middle of September, Keith’s in October and Katie’s April, but she was born a year after the boys, so she’s the youngest, yet still the smartest.

Lance suddenly starts dancing in his room, it’s his famous, excited dance. He actually has dances for every occasion possible, which is really funny, if you’d ask Keith. Lance can’t wait to meet his friends, even though they see each other everyday. He was this excited he managed to wake up this early, of which his family probably highly disapproves. It’s Saturday, so everyone wants to sleep as long as possible, and Lance is clearly ruining this right now. He doesn’t see any problems with that, but everyone else clearly does.

He sprints to his parents’ bedroom, passing rooms of his siblings, hearing muffled groans and whines, but he decides to ignore them. One day of waking up early won’t hurt any of them, even if this day happens fourth time this week.

“Mamá, mamá, can I have a phone call now?” He yells right behind her ear, causing his dad (he doesn’t know why him, actually) to hide his face under the covers.

“Lance, honey, I love you, mijo, but it’s barely seven, I’m sure your friends are still asleep,” she apparently wishes she was asleep as well, but you can’t always have what you want, so she has to live with it.

“They are not! Katie is already at Hunk’s, I can bet!” He decides to argue with his mother. She doesn’t know his friends, so how does she know whether they are asleep or not?

“Leandro!” His mom uses his full name to shush him, but no, it won’t stop him from getting the call.

“But, mamá!” He whines loudly.

After realizing it all’s worth nothing, he decides to go to Rachel’s room instead. It’s right next to his one, so she’s probably aware of the fact that Lance’s awake now. Well, the question is, who isn’t aware of it?

Right after slamming the door open, he’s ready to talk, but, unfortunately, his sister is a lot faster.

“No, Lance, no, no, don’t you dare start with your ‘Keith is so cool’ mood! We both know that, I mean, I know all of that, brother, but please, don’t make me listen to it at seven in the morning!” She’s way more than wide awake, but still a little sick of her younger brother. “Yes, before you say anything, I know you can talk about Keith for hours, and I’m here to listen to it, but right now, on Saturday, really isn’t the best time for that,” she laughs at the last part, but Lance still wants to talk.

“But Rachel, nobody said I was gonna talk about Keith!” He defends himself. “I just wanted to talk to my sister, because, you know, mamá doesn’t want to, so yeah, I’m here. By the way, you won’t believe it, but summer break is going on only for a few weeks now, but still, my soccer skills improved much! I can show you, if you’d like.”

“Would be nice,” Rachel is also into soccer, but same as Lance, not in any kind of professional way, she’s the match-watching type, she wishes she could play, but that’s not meant for her.

“Okay, cool, I’ll show you when I’m back from my match! Besides, you like summer as much as I do? It’s weird, because we’ve been to Cuba only once, but I still feel like that’s my home, somehow. Like I have two homes, actually, but nevermind. I think summer is… perfect for me! I don’t like it when it’s cold outside, except when it’s raining, but still, it’s better when it’s warm! Actually, Keith says— oops, I wasn’t gonna talk about him!” He chuckles quietly, but Rachel doesn’t interrupt him, so he goes on. “Anyways, Keith says warm weather makes him feel sick, it’s weird, I don’t understand this, but he seems cool when we hang out, so I really don’t know what’s the deal here. When I talk like that, his face gets really pink-ish, it’s funny, he looks like he’s angry, but he’s not!” He gestures rapidly, as his excitement increases minute by minute.

“He’s flustered, probably,” Rachel explains, adjusting her position on the bed. “But like, not mad-flustered, rather love-flustered,” she’s very aware of the feelings her brother holds towards Keith, but she’s almost the same age, so she doesn’t really like teasing him about it, she’s rather supportive.

“Oh, Dios Mio, Rachel!” He thinks his ears are seriously playing tricks on him. “You really think he loves me!?” Well, if he asked anyone, they would all say Keith loves him, it’s literally impossible to think otherwise.

“Yes, I think so,” she laughs louder, as she really can’t believe in what her brother just said.

“That’s awesome! But you see, there’s this stupid guy, James, from our school, who’s most certainly jealous of Keith and I, because he’s got some sorta problem, I don’t really know!” He recalls the May events, but erases them as he doesn’t want to ruin the mood. “Well, nevermind! I can’t wait to go to the field and finally play! I wonder if Katie will be better than last time, because, you know, she tripped on her shoelaces and fell down, and she blamed Matt for this! I was very super confused, because Matt wasn’t even there with us. Oh, and—,” before he gets to finish, he hears the phone ringing from downstairs.

He quickly waves Rachel goodbye and literally flows down the stairs, followed by his sister’s outburst of laughter. He doesn’t even pay attention to this, the only thing that matters is reaching the phone before the person on the other side of the line gets bored and hangs up. He picks up after ten extremely long seconds and hears the muffled laugh from the phone.

“Hey, Lance, it’s Katie! You don’t actually know this, but I stole Matt’s phone and I’m calling you from it!” She brags, then gets to the reason why she’s calling. “Hunk and I will be at yours in ten minutes, is that okay?” Sometimes, she just chimes in and doesn’t even care about permission, but still, it’s early, so she doesn’t want to disturb the family’s life.

“Absolutely! I’ll just get my bag and will be ready in a few! Hunk’s at yours, right?” He asks, already knowing the answer.

“Yeah, currently fighting with Matt for the last bowl of Cheerios, but we’re about to head out, actually. But I’m afraid we’ll all have to go and get Keith, he definitely overslept. We tried phoning him, but his mom says he’s still sleeping!”

“Won’t be a problem, he literally lives next door!” Lance answers, gesturing something, then realizing it’s stupid, as his friend won’t see him. “Okay, bye, Katie, see ya soon!” He hangs up and starts running to his room in order to get the very essential things.

He goes back to his room, grabbing his bag and shoving some towels, soccer shoes (Keith made him buy them, because he couldn’t stand Lance playing in his damaged old trainers), a ball and a bottle of water, well, at least he tries to shove them all. He hears his family slowly getting up and going down the stairs, as they don’t see a purpose of sleeping any longer as Lance’s already woken them up.

Lance struggles with finding his shoes and the ball, which are supposed to be under his bed, but turns out they’re nowhere to be seen. He even wants to blame someone, preferably Marco, as Luis is too old for this. Actually, Marco is too, but he’s the only one to blame, as no other person here is interested in playing sports.

Eventually, he finds his things shoved into his wardrobe, not knowing how they got there. He would be wondering ‘how?’, but there’s absolutely no time for this, as he suddenly hears the doorbell ringing. He runs to the kitchen, again, almost falling down. Yes, Katie warned him her and Hunk will be there soon, but it’s still completely unexpected.

“Mamá, I’m going out!” He yells, grabbing the keys from the counter and immediately exits the house.

He hugs his friends and they take the enormous amount of fifteen steps to reach Keith’s house.

It’s small, awfully tiny in comparison to Lance’s one. Outside walls are painted in boring white, though Keith would like them red, but his parents don’t seem to agree. Even the garden doesn’t have any child-like features, it’s just grass and grass only, nothing more. His parents aren’t really fond of these kind of kids, but lucky for Keith, he lives very close to Lance, who’s got younger siblings, which results in having a lot of funny things to play with. Keith enjoys them, secretly, but he’s too proud to admit it out loud.

Lance knocks upon the door, waiting for someone to answer it. The whole family has some issues, causing them to function like their brains were constantly bugged, which was actually pretty funny, but not when Keith’s friends were actually exploding from excitement.

Finally, finally, Anne shows up, wearing a messy braid and a light pink nightgown. Yeah, pretty possible that they woke her up, kind of unintentionally, but well, it happened. Also, they hear an unpleasant groan from the inside, it’s probably Nick trying to get up, being highly unhappy with it. Lance can’t help but smile, while he’s explaining why actually they’re here at eight in the morning. This whole family is impossible, they can literally sleep in for the whole day, lucky they can’t do that every day.

“Okay, come in— Keith’s upstairs,” she manages to say, a yawn interrupting her in the middle of the sentence. Then she lets them in and Lance immediately gets to the stairs, while Katie and Hunk are watching him in awe. They aren’t here often, because Keith doesn’t like sitting in his house (when he’s not asleep, of course), but Lance still spends plenty of time here, so he feels like he’s at his own home.

When they enter the room, they find Keith passed out on his bed, exactly as expected. He’s completely unaware of the things happening around him. They try their best to behave as silent as possible, because as much as they want to wake Keith up quickly, they don’t want to give him a stroke or anything.

Lance has his own, personal (plus really affectionate) ways of waking Keith up and he hopes they’ll work now. The first one is pretty simple. Lance kneels down by Keith’s bed and watches him sleep peacefully. It’s a shame to wake him up, but the match won’t wait forever. He starts stroking his hair gently, probably too gently, so he pulls it slightly, but it still doesn’t work.

The second way is actually funny. Lance brushes Keith’s hair out of the way and starts to slowly kiss his whole face. Katie and Hunk watch him, laughing. It’s like the low budget version of ‘Sleeping Beauty’, but with two princes and no marriage afterwards. Lance whispers in Keith’s ear, hoping that blowing air will help, but, surprise! it doesn’t, not at all. As much as Lance likes kissing Keith’s cheeks, he can’t do that forever, so it’s time for Stage Three of Operation: Waking Up Keith Kogane™.

“Hunk, grab that pillow, over there!” Lance gestures to the little armchair by the window. “Katie, get this one from the floor!”

After preparing their weapons, Lance expressly yells ‘fire!’ l, so they start throwing pillows at Keith. He has many of them in his room, fortunately, so they have many fluffy bullets to use. Some feathers fly out of one and land on Keith’s face, but even this little tickling isn’t waking him up. Unbelievable!

When they run out of pillows, they just start to pick up random objects, the only rule is that they have to be somehow soft and definitely not hard, hurting Keith is not what they want. It's been fifteen long minutes and anything changes. Keith is still in the same position they saw him and his friends are just exhausted from trying to wake him up.

“Hey, I have an idea!” Katie states, pulling Matt’s old MP3 from her bag. “Remember when you made me download 'Hips don’t lie’, after I lost the bet?” She reminds Lance, who nods furiously, holding back his laughter. “So, Keith has an ultimate hatred for this song, we can blast it and, hopefully, it will wake him up!”

Then she sets the device in full volume and looks for the song, while Hunk’s sitting on the desk, visibly sleepy and tired. This song’s gonna make him go awake, Katie just has to find it. Which she does, after a solid minut od searching. She clicks on the screen a few times, yelling for Keith’s parents to cover their ears. In seconds, the whole room is filled with these annoying, pop song sounds, that Lance seems to be the only one to actually enjoy them.

Keith, as expected, sits up on his bed, rubbing his eyes and trying to track the source of this horrible noise.

“What the fuck—,” he mumbles, after his eyes finally reach his friends, one of them holding this demonic device. He doesn’t care about the language, not after he was woken up that way. He only brushes his hair, trying to make it look acceptable, as it just occurred to him that they’re going out in a few minutes.

“Aw, you look cute in bed hair!” Lance coos, giggling.

If ‘cute’ means: looking like he got out of the coma, hair facing every direction in the world, still unaware of what’s happening, then yeah, indeed, Keith looked super massively cute.

“What did I do to you?” He whines, yawning. There must be some less damaging ways of waking up, this cannot be the only one. If it is, then Keith is undoubtedly, very much screwed.

“You overslept,” Katie answers simply, as if this allows her to damage Keith’s hearing like that.

“Aw, Keithy, don’t be mad and get changed already, I’m sick of waiting!” Lance yells at him, but it doesn’t sound even a bit angry. “Even if I got to kiss you multiple times, we scheduled a game and I am not waiting any longer!”

“Fine,” Keith’s voice is raspy, making him sound older than he really is. It’s just a small fact, but somehow makes Lance’s heart melt every time he hears it.

They let Keith change quickly, laughing at his weird moves. Actually, neither Katie nor Hunk have ever seen sleepy Keith, as he was never attending the crew sleepovers. It says ‘quickly’, but in fact it takes Keith around ten minutes to get dressed properly and then another five to find the lost bottle of water. Lance is actually the one who manages to find it, tucked in between the bed and the wall, none of them had any idea of how it got here. Keith guesses it was Lance who placed it there, but he denies it, so there’s no proof and it’s no time for investigation.

They say goodbye to Keith’s parents and start walking to the field. It’s actually not this one near school, as they may meet James and other stupid people here, and they don’t want to let them ruin their perfect summer break, so they decide to choose the other one. This field is set nearer the center, farther away from the seaside, twenty minute walk from Lance’s house. Nobody from school knows about this one, so they call it their ‘secret place’. Actually, there are rarely people here, mostly just high school students, but only during their school year, so now this place is rather fully empty.

The pitch reminds them of a stadium, it’s not this big, but close enough to call it that way. There’s also this nice guy in his early thirties, who lets them borrow all the equipment for free. You actually have to pay five dollars for every hour you spend here, but they’re only kids, plus really nice ones, so they get a discount (if it can be considered one, which everyone doubts,but that’s not the case). It’s mainly because of Hunk’s natural charm and adorableness. Everyone falls in love with this child, he doesn’t even have to try.

Well, Keith’s not really a lovable kid here, but Lance loves him and for him Keith didn’t have to try either.

Once they enter the pitch, they sit on the grass and start to talk about the game. Only in general, because there aren’t many rules that could be followed. They definitely don’t care about the official rules that apply during Keith’s games, because, for real, who can remember them all? Even Keith doesn’t, and – Lance’s words – if he doesn’t remember, then nobody else will, never. There are no people to watch the game as well, no referees, which means only people playing can decide whether something is considered a penalty, or not really. Though, there aren’t may, because who would like to do such thing to their friends?

Lance pulls out his ball, making the game start. He chooses to be Keith’s team, because he’s Keith’s, well, everything, so Hunk decides (there’s not much to decide about, but still!) to join Katie, who really improved her skills lately.

Her passes get more and more professional each day and Lance even starts to get jealous, because ‘How can she be so good already? Unfair!’ She scores four, or even five, with Hunk’s help, who’s got enormous strength in his legs. He even runs impossibly fast, despite being a little of a chubby kid.

But Lance’s got Keith, so he’s actually got victory. And it’s not that he chose Keith only to win, they’re best friends after all, they can’t survive a day without each other.

“Keith, can you stop messing with the ball and pass it to me so I can score!?” He yells, literally blaming Keith for playing like a decent person would.

“By the way, are there any goalkeepers?” Katie asks, being rather close to the goal, when Keith finally passes the ball to Lance, who almost tripps at it.

“You’re one right now!” Katie’s bluntly looking around as Lance yells this one sentence, seconds before shoving the ball in Katie and Hunk’s goal.

She’s standing two feet in front of it, acting like she didn’t know the ball would actually pass by her and fall into the goal. She gestures at it, as if she was ready to kill it with only one glance. Lance overcame her, again, and the most important question was ‘why Hunk wasn’t here, where he was supposed to be?’ He’s the better goalkeeper, way better than Katie and he should be there to help her. Actually, what the hell was he doing on the other side of the pitch? There are literally two people in each team, and the two of them from the other team were on their side of the field. And Hunk, well, Hunk probably got really, really confused and was defending the wrong goal. Now, after the game’s ended, it becomes impossibly funny and they all just can’t help themselves from laughing.

Lance lands with his face in the grass, as he couldn’t stand still any longer. They got literally wrecked, but in a really good way. They laugh all the time, living their best lives right now. They promised to themselves that they will enjoy their childhood as much as possible, because these are years they won’t ever get back, even if they wished.

“Hey— Keith!” Lance asks in between a few heavy breaths, as well as quiet giggles. “There’s my birthday in three weeks, remember?” He’s lying down on the grass, facing Keith.

“Yup, I know, twenty eighth,” he answers, playing like he’s not tired at all, but Lance knows him best, so he doesn’t believe it even for a minute. Actually Keith’s wondering what popped up in Lance’s head again. It’s obvious that he remembers the date of his best friend’s birthday, how could he forget?

“I want to get something special,” Lance continues, moving closer to Keith, so now their noses are only two inches away. “From you!” He pokes Keith’s chest with his lanky finger, causing Keith to laugh uncontrollably.

“Sure you’ll get that,” he smirks slightly.

Lance immediately gets up to the sitting position, looking his friend in the eyes. He begins processing things quickly, trying to think about the best answer for that. Of course he wants to know what he’ll get, but he doesn’t know if Keith will be up to telling him. He can use his charm to get his answer, but it doesn’t work every time, so he can’t be sure it’ll work this particular time.

He’s beyond excited, his whole body begins to shake similar way to when they were both talking before Keith’s important game. He loves presents and that is the well-known fact everyone are aware of. The best ones he gets are from his special ones, so it means mainly from Keith. Of course, Lance doesn’t deny that Katie and Hunk are also pretty important to him, but Keith is just something different. Lance loves him the most and can’t even think about one thing that makes Keith this important. He just is, period. No need to say anything more.

“Mind telling me what are your plans?” He asks, finally deciding that it’s better than staying silent. If he did it that way, Keith would never tell him.

“Maybe,” he teases. Oh no, he’s not this weak, he won’t give in this quickly, not today. Keith can be strong with Lance whenever he wants to, that’s for sure.

“Oh, come on!” Lance suddenly yells at him, unaware of that Hunk and Katie are watching them the whole time. Eventually, he leans even closer and connects their lips together in a quick smooch.

Keith is fucked.

No need to tell anything more, one kiss and Lance has him wrapped around his finger. Keith’s not even against it, he just refuses to admit that it works on him that way.

“Fine, I’ll give you a birthday kiss, like, the real one, at the pool, because your party’s at the pools, right? You like that?” He actually hesitates for a moment, he’s not so sure about that now. He never was, but saying that out loud didn’t help, as he thought it will.

“Oh my God,” Lance places his palm on his mouth and this reaction doesn’t help Keith at all. He’s even more confused than he was before, hoping it’s nothing too bad. “Yes! Yes, it’s at the pools! And yeah, I’d like that, the present, you know! Dios Mio, Keith, I love you so much!”

They end up in a tight embrace, Lance doesn’t believe people like Keith actually exist. It’s impossible that this angel in human’s body lives just next door and decides to spend his days with Lance. Maybe he doesn’t deserve it, maybe he does, that’s not the case now. The only thing Lance cares about is his love, he hopes it will last forever, because, well, he doesn’t see himself with anyone other than Keith.

He’s pretty sure this birthday is gonna be the best one he’ll ever have and he can only hope that every next one will be only better, if that’s even possible.

☆° ◆ ～ ◆ °☆

July twenty first comes faster than Lance thinks it will do. He’s been rambling about his birthday so much that his family is pretty sure that the whole neighborhood knows about it already. That’s even accurate, because they sometimes happen to hear their neighbors talking about ‘little Cuban boy’s’ birthday, as they address to Lance. It’s funny, Emanuela joins the conversations sometimes, when she’s got some time, she even invited some kids to her son’s party, hoping he won’t mind it. She thinks that he probably wouldn’t even notice, as he’ll be way more interested in spending time with his very best friends.

Now the whole Serrano family is spending time together, ‘bonding’, as Keith calls it whenever Lance tells him about it. They somehow manage to fit on the couch, barely, but still. It’s not that it’s not big, which it definitely is, it’s just nearly impossible to fit ten people on one piece of furniture. Emanuela holds the remote control, increasing the volume of some Spanish soap opera whenever somebody decides to comment what’s happening on screen a little too loud.

Lance can’t focus on the TV even for a second. He’s sitting on the edge of the couch, near Veronica, who’s currently discussing the show with Marco. He would more likely go to his room and talk to one of his older siblings in private, but you can’t always have what you want. Now’s time for ‘family bonding’ and he has to respect it.

“Hey, Vee,” he calls his sister quietly, when his voice breaks a little. He sounds genuinely heartbroken, very close to crying, which is completely unlike him.

“Yeah, Lance?” A seventeen-years-old girl is slightly concerned. She knows something is wrong, and can even guess what’s that about. Every worries of Lance are somehow connected with Keith, but these were always just small and solved quickly. This time was different and Veronica knows it. “What’s the matter? You can tell me anything, remember?” She tries to encourage him to talk, making sure they don’t disturb family’s fun time. They almost whisper, because Lance doesn’t like to get everyone involved.

“I haven’t heard from Keith for, like, past four days. His home phone’s not answering any of my calls nor Hunk’s and Katie’s, it’s weird. Also, his parents’ car is not parked on the driveway, as it should be. Maybe they just went somewhere, like, on vacation, but I’m sure he’ll let me know if it happened. I’m just worried, Vee and I don’t know what to do!” He sadly whisper yells, his eyes shiny with little tears forming in the corners of them.

“You know, Lance, maybe they had some sort of family issues and didn’t plan it all. Remember when we had to leave to see abuelo last year? It was completely unplanned and you couldn’t phone Keith as well. We went there immediately, maybe they had emergency like that as well. I promise that Keith will let you know what’s going on soon, whenever he has time to do it,” she smiles widely, really hoping that Keith will do. He always does, so why this time would be different? There’s no way to think that way.

Emanuela stand up from the couch and quickly goes to the kitchen in order to get some snacks, as the soap opera marathon is definitely not gonna end soon. She takes a glance on the phone, noticing the name that slowly appears on it. They bought a new phone not so long ago and the new one allowed them to actually see who’s calling. It still wasn’t the newest one, but having a home phone was cool, especially when you have kids who don’t have their own smartphones yet.

“Mijo, phone for you again!” She doesn’t even have to say a name, everyone knows it’s actually for Lance. She can’t believe that these kids can’t just come over and talk like she used to do, but she guesses the kids nowadays are a lot different than when she was their age.

Lance rushes to the phone, forgetting about his worries for a bit. He grabs the device quickly, not sure who to expect on the other side. He doesn’t care about checking it on the screen, but he secretly hopes that’s Keith calling, even though his mom would probably tell him if it was him.

“Hey!” He exclaims to the phone, receiving a soft laugh as an answer.

“Hi, Lance!” Katie responds eventually, still giggling slightly. “Wanna come over to me? We’re planning on watching this eighties’ cartoon, it’s called ‘Voltron’, my parents watched it, when they were young! But, yeah, Hunk will be here, too! We can annoy Matt as well, I’m sure my parents won’t mind that at all!” Katie laughs loudly when they both can hear Matt’s unpleasant groan. It’s impossible to make this noise this loud it can be heard from upstairs, but they’re sure Matt can’t be fully human. He’s a monster, or an alien, definitely not an Earthling.

“Sure, let me ask mamá first!” He immediately covers the microphone, so girl’s ears won’t die from his surprisingly loud scream. “Mamá, can I have a movie night at Katie’s!? Everyone’ll be here, no worried, Hunk as well, please mamá!” He kept shouting, forgetting that his mother is literally behind the wall, which means maximum five feet away.

“Okay, fine,” she answers, also laughing. It’s kinda funny how atmosphere in this house can change only within seconds. “Luis will pick you up from Katie in the morning. Veronica, could you please bring Lance’s bag here?” She asks her oldest daughter.

Yes, Lance always has a bag for eventual sleepovers, that happen quite often, so it’s absolutely necessary to be prepared, because you never know when somebody will phone, just like Katie did.

“Thank you, mamá!” He smiles at her, coming back to his phone call. “Okay, I’m coming, so prepare video games, ‘cause I’m gonna kick your ass!” He yells a little violently, or at least pretends to, because it sounds way more like an entertained, battle cry Lance uses whenever some kind of game is about to happen.

“Language, Lance!” His mother does not approve this way of speaking, but Lance can barely hear her, as he quickly grabs his bag and runs to the door.

It’s only half a mile or so to Katie’s house, so he can definitely manage and go there on foot. He exhales loudly when he goes by the awfully quiet house of Keith and his parents. Usually you could here loud conversations, not arguing, Keith just has a tendency to talk way louder than he should, which is pretty funny during the lessons, when talking really should be quiet.

Lance enters Katie’s house after a ten minute walk, greeting her mother, who’s cleaning the dishes in the kitchen. It’s actually Matt’s job to do, but now he’s got an important essay on which he should focus. He passes by the kitchen and enters the living room, where he finds Katie and Hunk lying on the couch, preparing to play Mario Kart.

“Can I quit?” Hunk asks as soon as he’s given the controller. He hates games, because he’s literally terrible at them, he just doesn’t get all the hype, but Katie won’t let him stay behind.

“No way, Hunk!” She shouts at him, starting the game. “You’re having your first one against me, then with Lance,” she gives him quick instructions before diving right into the game.

As Hunk suspected, he sucks extremely. He quickly loses his round, making Katie make a bunch of weird noises. She actually yells all the time, mainly at Lance, who’s still trying to get the pad from her, because, as he says ‘it’s my turn now, come on!’ When the two of them start playing, they’re both shouting random sentences, and someone, probably Matt, is shouting back at them, but everything's too loud, so they can’t be sure.

Lance doesn’t wanna admit it, but Katie is a true goddess in Mario Kart. She’s impossibly good in this game, as if she was born with this controller in her hand. Lance refuses to admit that she’s winning almost every game they’re playing. Still, he’s not extremely sad, as he manages to win a few rounds, so it’s all cool.

Then, Colleen chimes in, slamming the front door close, after shouting a quick ‘thanks!’ to the pizza delivery boy. She “brigs food to the kids, placing it in front of them, on the little coffee table. Katie and Hunk dig in rather quickly, while Lance keeps staring at his food with glowing eyes, as he doesn’t really have the opportunity to eat stuff like this often.

“Dios Mio, Mamá would literally kill me if she saw me now!” He laughs, grabbing the first slice.

Hunk looks at him, confused, but doesn’t say a single word.

“Why though?” Katie decides to speak up, as she wants to know what’s the actual matter here. “What’s wrong with pizza? Matt orders it every time his friends come over, which is, at least once a week.”

“My family’s kinda sorta traditional, especially mamá. I have no idea why, but she usually doesn’t accept foods that are made outside our house. We can go to these traditional restaurants, whatever, but at very best!” He explains quickly, glancing at Bae Bae, who’s way too interested in kids’ food.

“Kinda sucks. Do you even like it?” Hunk asks, visibly concerned. It would be weird for him to live without all this food, even though he comes from a traditional country as well.

“Hell no!” Lance chuckles. Swearing, another thing forbidden in his house. “Bae Bae, don’t,” he rises up the pizza container as the dog comes closer, hoping to get some free food.

Katie stands up, looking for this old VHS her parents keep somewhere in the drawer. It takes her a few minutes, as well as a few new words she’d learnt from Matt. She manages to find the tape with this Voltron: Defender of The Universe cartoon she was sometimes watching with her parents, when nostalgia hit them hard.

She puts it in the even older player, increasing the volume so they all can hear properly, as audio quality in the eighties was, lightly said, not very good. They all enjoy their marathon, but Matt, apparently, doesn’t. They can assume that after they hear him screaming from upstairs.

“Katie, for God’s sake! Turn it down, I’m trying to write this goddamn essay!” He snaps as his sister, causing her to immediately grab the remote control and turn the volume down. She can be mean to her brother sometimes, but she understands the importance of good work perfectly, so she doesn’t want Matt to fail because of her.

“You wanna play soccer for a bit?” Hunk asks, after they all are finished with pizza. He has no particular clue about why he said that, but it happened and now he has to live with all the consequences.

“Would be cool, awesome, actually, but we don’t have enough players,” Katie’s got a point. “I don’t think Bae Bae will be a good one,” she silently recalls this one time when this monster, called a dog, tried to eat her ball and almost managed to do it, if Matt didn’t chime in and get this creature far away.

“Oh, right!” Lance practically jumps on his seat, as if he recalled something just now. “Does any of you know where Keith is?” He doesn’t look them in the eyes, his hopes suddenly rising up incredibly. He looks like he’s sure one of his friends knows something, they just have to, there’s no other option.

But Katie stares at him confusingly, looking like she had never heard of someone called Keith before. It’s clearly not true, but Lance can’t erase this unpleasant feeling in his stomach.

“He left without phoning me!” He cries out, hoping that this will make at least one of his friends speak.

“He did? Well, he didn’t call any of us either,” Hunk states, shifting slightly on the couch.

Lance thinks he may have made a mistake asking about Keith, but he can’t go back, so he decides to continue this conversation instead. Maybe, somehow, one of them will know something he doesn’t.

“Um… okay, it’s probably just a trip,” he whispers, unsure whether he’s trying to convince his friends or himself. Probably both. But then, unexpectedly, something pops up in his head, causing him to gasp uncontrollably. “Maybe he doesn’t love me and wanted to escape!?”

Now, Katie’s losing it. She starts laughing hysterically. This boy is impossible sometimes, especially when he’s this worried about his ‘boyfriend’, because that’s what Keith’s supposed to be called.

“Lance, you can’t be serious,” she says, after gasping for air with a snort. “Don’t start this again, oh my God! He for sure loves you, we all know this. No worries, buddy!” Hunk nods after Katie says all that, believing her words completely.

Lance smiled slightly, now fully convinced that she’s telling him the truth and truth only. It’s the second person to talk to him like that today, and both of them are impossibly important to him, so he’s got no other choice than to believe them. Because, to be honest, why would Keith leave him like that?

Lance is now fully sure that it’s just a family trip and his lovely friend will be back sooner than Lance can even imagine.

☆° ◆ ～ ◆ °☆

July twenty eighth, in Serrano household commonly known as Lance’s birthday, comes even quicker than any other day before. Normally, Lance would be excited as ever for it, but now he’s not quite sure about how he feels exactly. Of course, he’s happy to finally turn twelve, but also worried, as Keith has been absent for almost two weeks now.

He’s never been like that before and Lance’s insecurities began to take control. He wishes Keith’s phone could at least respond, so he would know what happened to his best friend and he couldn’t be as worried as he is now. But, still, he can’t have everything he desires, so he just keeps telling himself that Keith will come back today, as he never missed Lance’s birthday before.

Lance wakes up early and runs down the stairs to sit by the phone and wait for his friends to call. It’s their well-known tradition, phoning to say ‘happy birthday’, before telling him that in person, during the party. Keith is always, surprisingly, one of the first people to call him. Once, he told Lance that he’s setting ten alarms to wake up early enough to phone with wishes. Lance found that really adorable, he still does, so he hopes it will be exactly the same this year.

After waiting not longer than fifteen minutes, the phone rings for the first time. Lance doesn’t even look at the screen, he just picks up and wait for the voice to appear on the other side of the line.

“Hey there! It’s Katie!” She exclaims happily, probably being on a speaker, as he can hear her clapping her hands. “And Matt, too!” The older boy added from afar, preparing his things. “Happy birthday, Lancey!” They synchronize perfectly and Lance is sure that they must’ve been practicing this a lot.

He’s waiting again while he’s thinking about Allura, the new girl in their neighborhood, who moved here from England not so long ago, maybe a week or so. She caught up with the crew immediately, just like she was a missing member. She’s very pretty, chocolate-colored complexion contrasting perfectly with her light blonde, almost white, hair. Lance’s heart belongs to Keith and Keith only, but he still can say she’s gorgeous. Older than him, she turned twelve in January, so it’s still not much.

He feels exactly like he’d called her, because her name is the next one to pop up on the phone’s screen.

“Hey, Lance,” she says, using her British accent and pronouncing Lance’s name this odd way. “Happy birthday, little boy!” She likes to tease him about being older, but they always just laugh at it, because it’s not that she really cares who’s the older one, it simply doesn’t matter to any of them. She’s pretty excited for the party and now Lance can’t say he’s the same, but he still decides to respond.

“Thanks!” He forces a smile, so his words sound as happy as Allura’s. The last thing he wants is to make her worried, when she’s just ready to enjoy the boy’s birthday.

After she hangs up, Lance sighs loudly, trying not to think too much. Instead, he begin watching his family. They’re all running around, grabbing all the essentials and getting themselves ready for the party. This overly happy energy is all over the place, trying to get to Lance as well.

“Hey, who’s that?” He says when he picks up the phone, unbothered to check the screen again. It’s still not the habit he’d developed, so he adds it to his to-do list: learn to see who’s calling before picking up, noted.

“It’s Hunk, happy birthday, buddy!” Hunk, being his adorably cute self, sounds even more innocent than normally. Lance hears him smiling ans he wishes he could say the same about himself, but he’s not even close to that.

“Yeah, happy…” he sighs loudly, realizing he probably blows the air right into phone’s speaker.

“Something’s wrong?” You can say many things about Hunk, and being overly caring towards his friends is definitely one of them.

“No, not really. Family’s just kinda exhausting now, getting all ready and stuff, it’s noisy here,” he states, turning the phone into living room’s direction, letting Hunk hear all the loud shouting he has to go through. “Okay, we’re getting to the cars in seconds, so see you at the pools, Hunky!”

Lance decides he will just have fun today, as usual, because it’s not a good thing to be this worried during your own birthday party. He jumps to the car, sitting between Rachel and Sophie, chatting with them expressingly, just like they always do.

They have two cars, because going anywhere with ten people stuffed inside only one vehicle would never be a good idea. They park near the entrance of the pools, Lance rushing outside as soon as the car stops, causing his mom to call after him, but he’s too happy to even hear her.

He meets up with Hunk, Katie, Allura, and a bunch of other school pals. They’re friends of everyone in the crew, so there are also a few players from school’s soccer team. Keith’s team. Lance looks around quickly, waiting for Keith to jump out of some bushes, but nothing like that happens. Keith is not here, Lance is pretty sure about that. But no, he doesn’t give up, not at all, Keith would’ve overslept again and he will show up sooner than Lance will imagine.

Lance immediately learns that birthday in the pools is the best choice he’s ever made. There’s an impossible amount of things to fo here, but it all starts when everyone decides to hand their presents to Lance. He quickly thanks them all, putting his gifts away, or handing them to Emanuela. They say money can’t buy you happiness, but things bought with money can cause happiness – that’s Lance’s golden thought for today, or, well, for any other day, too.

Then they just conquer the pools and Lance can feel all the negative emotions flood away with water he’s surrounded by. That’s the main reason why they have a bath at home. Every person in this family deals best with their emotions in water, no matter what kind of water it is exactly.

Lance starts to play fight with Katie and Hunk, at the same time glancing at Allura, who is currently talking with Ryan from the school’s team. He can’t help but smile all the time, spending the best time of his life.

But, not so long after, everything hits him again, but two times harder. When Katie and Hunk are to busy to notice him, he puts on his flip flops and slowly goes to the ‘beach’, which is actually the big place all covered in sand, located at the east side of the pools. Lance likes it a lot, as barely someone knows about it and he can peacefully think about stuff.

He feels bad leaving his guests on their own, but there are so may people they won’t even see him disappear. Besides, he doesn’t feel comfortable with faking his feelings, so it’s better if he goes away for a few minutes and come back, mind clear and ready for having fun again.

He starts compulsively imagining what Varadero can be like. He remembers every single word his siblings told him about this place. Personally, it seems like an incredible town to live in and Lance would like to have an opportunity to do so, just live Veronica, Rachel, Marco and Luis did. Still, even just imagining all of this makes him suddenly calmed and relaxed, especially when he closes his eyes and just sees ot under his eyelids. He likes to compare his own, imaginary Varadero to Heaven, as he’s pretty sure that’s what it looks like.

It was even that one time lat year, when he promised Keith that they will both fly to Cuba when they’ll be older. He actually promised a lot of things, starting with this weird marriage thing when they were three, many more promises came with time and Lance can’t help but think about them all the time. Like that, he was always promising Keith that they will be always together, that he’ll get Keith on vacation with him one time. Also, there was plenty of other, less important things, like promising to catch Keith up with math, when he was busy practicing.

Lance wants to stop thinking about this boy, but that’s literally impossible. Everything in his life is somehow connected with Keith and Lance actually likes that rather much, but not really during this moment. Still, he decides to focus on the good things and memoried that they made before Keith suddenly disappeared.

Katie walks to her friend quietly, trying not to scare him too much. Turns out it wasn’t necessary at all, as he’s this lost in his thoughts he wouldn’t hear her even if she started screaming. She sits by his side, watching him as he stares at something in front of him, but she can’t catch what Lance is exactly looking at. Or maybe looking for? As he’s this focused, he might as well be looking for something important, everything’s possible.

“You alright?” She asks, poking his shoulder, which causes him to snap out of his thoughts. “I know you and you never miss the opportunity to swim, especially with us,” she’s right, but Lance doesn’t want to admit it, never.

“Actually, no. I can’t believe he didn’t show up!” He whines. Lance doesn’t even have to say the name, Katie already knows who he’s talking about. “He didn’t even phone me, he didn’t do anything! I don’t even know where he is!” He suddenly yells. It’s good that the party is still ongoing, because nobody really pays attention to him now. His voice cracks unexpectedly, eyes fully watery now, he refuses but still, he’s slowly starting to cry. “Hey, he wanted to kiss me, it was important for me— for both of us and I just… can’t believe it! Katie, maybe— he didn’t love me?” He’s full with concern, but still refuses to believe all these things.

“C’mere, Lance,” Katie gestures to him and after a moment hugs tightly, trying her best to comfort him. “I’m pretty sure he loves you and all of these things weren’t done on purpose. Hey, I know!” She’s suddenly got an idea, hoping it will make Lance feel better. “I’ll go get Hunk and then we can walk to his house and see if he’s back, okay?” She asks him softly, acting completely unlike her. She may joke around a lot, but she still cares about her friends when they’re not in their best moments.

“Um, okay,” he hesitates for a moment, but agrees anyways, because he’s got nothing else to do with it.

Katie jumps up and runs to get Hunk, but it takes her some time, as Hunk isn’t probably as fond of sneaking out as Katie is. He’s just too cute and pure for this, but friendship equals sacrifices, so he knows he will go for it anyways.

They both come back to Lance and they begin walking to his house. Lance is not as sad as before, because everything Katie said made his own hopes go up again, just a little lower than it did a week ago. Hunk is the one rambling about his family, stuff he’s done during summer, so he’s basically just his overly adorable self, entertaining Lance with stupid, yet enjoyable stories.

Lance is thankful for friends like them, because they always know how to make him happy and they never fail in this, causing Lance to smile even when there’s nothing to smile about. This is truly amazing for him and he wishes he was like that, too. Well, actually, he was told that he’s like them a few times, if we don’t count Keith, who thought that Lance is the best and literally an angel on Earth.

When they enter Lance’s street, they spot a few homeless cats walking around. Veronica once told him that there were many of them back in Cuba, so Lance grows attached to these little animals that help him imagine his home country even better. Suddenly, one of the cats, fur colored in a weird, blue-ish tone, bounces its head over Lance’s calf.

He leans down to match the cat’s height more. He knows this one rather well, he calls ‘her’ (he supposes that it’s a girl) Blue, because of her fur color, she’s also his favorite homeless cat here.

“You want me to follow you, little girl?” He asks softly, stroking cat’s chin and slightly petting her head. The cat meows loudly as an agreement, straightening her tail and begins slowly walking to the end of the street. Lance can’t help but think that cats are damn wise creatures, probably the wisest he knows.

Lance walks to his house rather quickly, causing Katie and Hunk to have some serious issues with keeping their pace fast enough to catch up with their friend. He finally sees his house at the end of the road, familiar as it is, but something seems extremely off, he just can’t tell what exactly, so he decides to come closer. As he does, he feels his knees go weaker and weaker with each step, but still, there’s no any particular reason for that to happen.

Then it comes, well, first thing of a few that are definitely odd. Instead of the usual, white chevrolet classic, a huge, gray pickup is parked on the driveway of Keith’s house. Lance tries to comfort himself by thinking that maybe they bought the knew one, he literally prays for it to be true.

But then, he notices someone sitting inside of the car and that’s neither Anne nor Nick, so it’s impossible Keith’s here, too. He’s right, an elderly couple comes out of their vehicle and meet up with a middle aged man, whom Lance didn’t even see at first. Lance’s mind is obviously playing tricks at him, because he keeps seeing Nick in this man, but that’s definitely not him. Still, he believes that maybe these people are Keith’s grandparents, as Lance never saw them before, they can look, well, every way.

Now Lance knows he has to get what’s happening here, so he drags his friends even closer than they were standing before. That’s when Lance almost falls down after tripping on his flip flops. He sees it dug into the ground, bright red, almost alarming.

The ‘SOLD OUT’ sign.

It hits him harder than it should, he falls in Hunk’s arms right after seeing all this, he’s sobbing uncontrollably while both his friends try to comfort him. They’re failing, because still, they’re only kids and nobody besides Keith and Lance knew what kind of relationship these two had.

“I can’t believe that— Hunk, what? They— they sold it… why? What the hell is happening here!? Katie I— Where is Keith then? Just— where!? I don’t know, it just doesn’t make sense to me!” He begins screaming and whispering at the same time, choking on his own tears.

Katie and Hunk listen silently, while they’re walking Lance back to the party. There’s no reason for them to stay near this house when they don’t have to, but they don’t really know what they should do.

They explain everything to Lance’s parents, because he refuses to say a word after his sudden breakdown. He simply realizes it will never be the same without Keith around and he promises himself he won’t ever forget him. Keith will remain in his mind forever, Lance just won’t let go of his first love, first true friendship, first everything, he will never let go of Keith.

He will live each day with memories consisting of Keith.

**Author's Note:**

> didn't think i'll be posting in english, but here we are  
> feedback is appreciated!!  
> also, you can contact me on tumblr via @ loverboy-spritz
> 
> DECIDED TO TURN IT INTO A ONE SHOT, because the plot wasn’t really good and it works better that way, it’s like an open ending,,,, I guess??


End file.
